Sunday marked the first race in the 2019/2020 winter league series. The race was held at Fforest
Fields Camping Site in Builth Wells. With the amount of rain that we had had in the week before the
race, I think that each runner knew what to expect when it came to the conditions of the course and
they didn’t fail to deliver. Especially with the course being 2 laps, we would have to navigate over a
course on the second lap where 200 people had already travelled over which made it tough and
keeping your balance on the downhill sections became vital to make sure no speed was lost. The
course was 6 miles, with lots of undulating terrain. A particularly tough section was the climb after
we had come off the first field to the top of a narrow trail which then, fortunately, gave you a
rewarding downhill section to follow. It was also tough coming down through the woods and as
mentioned previously the amount of mud made keeping upright a tough task. On the whole though
a brilliant Cross-Country race that had a bit of everything. Uphill’s, Downhills, Mud, Trails and most
importantly cake afterwards.
20 Croft Men took on the tough course with some excellent results. Our first runner home was Mark
Lamonby, after all his success in Triathlon this season, such as going to the World 70.3
Championships he continued his fine form and came home in 4 th position. Next was Gareth Leek,
who after a very successful summer league series carried this into Sunday. He came home in a very
impressive 11 th position, really showing what a valuable member to the Croft Ambrey men’s team he
has become, especially in such a short space of time. I was next home in a time of 44.32 and just
made it into the top 20. The final member of the A team was Nigel Taylor, who is showing that all
the training he had put in for his across Wales run payed off and showed on Sunday coming home in
32 nd place. Nige was followed closely home by Glyn Williams and Matt Moffat who to had also done
the across Wales run, again showing how the amount of tough training sessions they completed
helped them achieve high finishing places on Sunday. Nigel Mason was next Croft runner in and after
a long spell out of the X/C races came back and still produced a good result coming home just behind
Matt ensuring that we had a good grouping up top. A debutant for Croft on Sunday was Eric Apperly
who in his first race had a good run and was home in 69 th position, definitely more to come from
Eric. Stuart Austin finished in 78 th place, and was unable to catch his nemesis Steve Herrington, who
was only 36 seconds in front. A battle that will carry on at the Croft course I’m sure. Nick Paviour
also showed determination and fight on a tough course and came home in 1:06. Bryan also keeps
showing us how his spirit and determination to keep going until the end is so valuable coming home
in 116 th place and if im still running that well when I get to that age I will be over the moon.
The results from the race are on the website and means that we sit in fourth position with 67 points.
The next race is Croft Castle on the 10 th of November. Well done to all those who competed and
onto the next one.
