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| Spoils were spread wide at the Sussex Road Relay Championships at Christ’s Hospital on Saturday when no less than nine clubs shared the eleven Crowns that were at stake.
Only Arena 80, who won the senior and Over 40 women’s titles and Brighton & Hove who took the Over 40 and Over 50 men’s titles took two titles.
Conditions were good for racing with little wind and although rain threatened to make it uncomfortable for the officials it did not last long and generally it was a great improvement on the forecast and indeed last year when the runners enjoyed high winds and sleet.
Crawley, who in recent years have struggled to get out their best team for this event came good on Saturday and took the senior mens title.
The Under 15 titles went to the Horsham Blue Star girls, for whom Johanna Spannagl broke her own year old record with 5:46, and Haywards Heath boys while the Under 13 saw Hastings take the girls race and Eastbourne the boy’s event.
The Over 50 women’s title went to Steyning where Joan Lennon anchored the team with a new course record of 13:06 and Lewes took the Over 60 mens title.
The senior men’s Six x 2-mile race saw the Crawley club included both Joel Kidger and Gavin Thompson in the same race for the first time for many years and they did lead throughout the race but maybe not quite as they had planned.
On the opening leg Joel Clewett, who had been relegate to the “B” team showed his mettle by leading the field home some thirty metres clear of Brighton & Hove’s Rob Ingham with Horsham Andy Robinson filling third place ahead of guest runner Alex Budd, running in a non scoring Worthing team, and James McCarthy, Brighton & Hove “B” before Matt Furber finished for the Crawley “A” team in sixth.
Louis Jones did the business on lap two taking the team into the lead after Brighton & Hove’s David Boyce had stormed past Crawley “B” team’s Tim Kimber well before the half-way mark and was looking good until Louis took up the lead and it was then Crawley all the way.
Gavin Thompson, in his first serious race for several months, stretched his 13 second lead to 25 seconds clocking 10:00, for the day’s third fastest lap, although Ollie Freeman (pictured) from Bodyworks, who had taken over in seventh place, moved up to second with the fastest lap time of the day of 9:36 to squeeze Brighton & Hove’s Andrew Donno back to third place.
Brighton & Hove’s James Tomlinson moved back into second place and closed the gap on Crawley’s Chris Johnson to 23 secs. while Bodyworks slipped back down the field.
On the penultimate lap Matt Bristow (Brighton & Hove) pegged back another ten seconds on Aaron Stone, who must have been satisfied with the fastest lap by a Under 17 runner in 10:13, and Dave Carter brought the Phoenix squad up four placed to third position.
The final circuit saw Joel Kidger stretch the Crawley lead to a handsome 32 seconds over Brighton & Hove’s Chris Thomson with Josh Guilmant running the second fastest time of the day in 9:55 but still more than one minute adrift of the silver medal placing.
The women’s race saw the Arena 80 club split their talent with the “B” team of Gemma Sharp, Jo Farrow and Julie Briggs lead throughout to beat their “A” team of Julie Drake, Fiona Clark, who actually made up 11 places on the second leg, and Caroline Hoyte recording 35:47 to 35:48 with Brighton & Hove City running in third place throughout the race.
Arena athletes ran the three fastest laps with Caroline clocking 10:59, just seven seconds outside her six-year old course record, Fiona recording 11:05 and Julie Briggs 11:26.
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