London Cross Country Championship

On Saturday 16th November 12 women and 13 men ran the London cross country championship at the iconic Parliament hill.

Great organisation and marshalling, no mud and the cool calm weather made for a good race day. Most improved their time from last year when the muddy conditions resulted in the London Youth games races being cancelled but Kathryn Ellis knocked 7 minutes off her 2023 time! 

We had great support from Sarah Moffatt, Sarah Ralphs and Josie Kimber. Once Pear Brown and Charlotte Gilligan had to stop giving out the numbers to go and race, Josie stepped in to give out men's numbers.

The women were lead home with the usual super performances by Karen Murphy and Jo Kent with Jana Jilkova and Kathryn making up the scoring team. 

Always good to see Ed Spencer and Tom Thain when they have time to come along to race for Barnet and District and together with Ed Fraser and Will Morris they closed out the men's team.

The day saw quite a few running Parliament hill for the first time and they all loved it and have no doubt already pencilled in Feb 22nd 2025 for the National Champs which is at Parliament hill this season.

The women ran over 6K, 120 m elevation and the team came 16th out of 25 clubs which completed teams (many didn't), the men 10.5K, 210m elevation and came 21st out of 38 clubs which completed teams. Both 4 to score. The scoring men had a great race considering the to'ing and fro'ing at the men's start contributed to them starting a couple of hundred down the pack.