Eight team titles and six county champions for Rugby & Northampton AC

Northamptonshire Cross Country Championships 2022 West Glebe Park, Corby

Rugby & Northampton AC were the dominant club at the Northamptonshire Cross Country Championships held at Corby’s West Glebe Park when they won 8 team titles and had 6 individual champions, writes Terry Egan.

Haydn Arnall won the 82nd running of the Senior Mens race when the 22 year old became the fifth R&N athlete to win the title after an early battle with Kettering’s Fynn Batkin before pulling away to win by 9 seconds over the 10k course in 32:02. William Gardner took bronze for the club in 32:40 while Finlay Ward in fourth place won the Junior crown in 32:49. Jack Bond recorded 33:24 for 5th spot and Fergus Scott claimed the U20 silver medal in 6th on 34:02 with Banbury’s Skip Snelson in 7th for Junior bronze (34:42). Completing the scoring six for R&N was Duncan Birtwistle in 9th position (36:40). The team score of 28 pts was their best ever and have now won 5 in a row. Kettering Town Harriers finished in second place. R&N had a clean sweep in the U15 Boys race over 5k with Arthur Tilt winning gold in 18:27 followed by Ben Smith (18:35) and Nathan Lamb (18:40) for a convincing team victory. The U11 Girls enjoyed team success when Elsie Bennett won the first race of the day for R&N with a time of 9:19 over the 2k distance from Kettering’s Bella Lamb (9:23) and was backed up by Amelie Heron in 3rd (10:05) and Florence Lambert 4th with 10:07. The U13 Girls did likewise for the club with another individual title going to Olivia Mcghee in 11:41 holding off Northampton AC’s Imogen Bennetts by 4 seconds over 3k and joining her in the winning team were Taylor Lyon (5th in 13:00) and Claudia Terrell (6th in 13:15). The Senior Womens race over 6k was won for the first time by Ellie Welch of Corby AC in a time of 25:36. Exactly half a minute behind was Wellingborough’s Alice Belcher for silver, but it was R&N that took another team victory with Emma Bond leading them home for the bronze medal in 26:35. Megan Stenhouse followed her home just 9 seconds adrift and took the U20 title and completing the squad was Lorna Hession in 10th place (30:03). Emily Williams (KTH) and Erin Treacy (Corby) were second and third respectively in the Junior competition with 28:46 and 31:06. Ruben Snelson of Banbury Harriers had a good win in the U17 Mens 6k race when he was timed at 23:25 and Stirling Green of Northampton AC clinched silver with 23:58. Louis Starr led home Rugby & Northampton for yet another team victory in third spot (24:41) and supporting him were Ned Gilford (6th in 25:11) and Danny Carter (8th in 25:28). The host club Corby AC had two more individual victories in the U11 and U13 Boys races. Barney Burman won the 2k U11 race by 1 second from Oliver Groves of Northampton AC with 8:39 and Edward Joyce won by the same margin in the U13 race over 3k with 11:06 from Raffaello Oliveti. Jack Twining of Northampton AC took bronze in 11:15. It was Rugby & Northampton that took both team gold medals in these age groups with Alexander Kampta recording 8:42 for U11 bronze along with Teddy Blake (4th in 9:21) and Will Bernard (5th in 9:25).

The winning U13 team consisted of Jake Clarke (5th in 11.31), Freddie Harris (7th in 11:52) and Willoughby Harrison (10th in 12:46) with a one point advantage over Kettering Town Harriers.

There was a good run from Kettering’s Magdalena Gancheva in winning the U15 Girls race over 5k with 20:58 and claiming the silver medal was R&N’s Ella Darby on 21:37 with Daventry AC’s Kate Pomerleau in 3rd on 22:07. The team winners though were Northampton AC and their leading runner was Zineb Zbirou Yatta in 5th position on 22:24 with Eva Stuart-Hill just one place and 5 seconds behind. Mariam Zbirou completed the trio in 9th spot (25:14).

There was a dominant display by Alice Bates in the 6k U17 Womens race when the Kettering athlete stormed home by over two and a half minutes to take the title in 26:00 with Ashleigh Walters of Corby AC in second on 28:38 and R&N’s Jemima Lambert winning bronze in 30:22.