Cross Country and Road round-up: Cameron McConnon wins at Uxbridge, Paulos Surafel 2nd at Reading Half Marathon
The second NW London Young Athletes Cross Country League fixture took place at Uxbridge on Saturday 30th October. The best result for TVH on a sunny autumn day saw an impressive run from Cameron McConnon in the U15 4km race, winning by nearly 30 secs and very well supported by Reggie Rock, Louis Moore and Harry Greenfields also leading the TVH team to first place. Further back in the same race the Girls result altered dramatically in the latter stages of the race with several runners going off course and running further and the TVH team of Maya Sutaria, Anna Kelly, Ava Levy and Natasha Bennett dropped back to 4th place.
Max Bishop had his best race so far this season finishing in 6th place in the U17 5km race with Morris Rock and Charlotte Edge also running well.
Luis da Silva and Jacob Sabbata both arrived with seconds to spare before the start of the U11 race and they both finished strongly after having to warm-up over the first half of the 2km race. Zachary Moore and Sunny Jabbar also both finished strongly in the 3km U13 race.
The National Cross Country Relays returned to a windy Berry Hill Park in Mansfield on Saturday 6th November. In a high quality men’s race with teams of 4 athletes each running 5km, the TVH A team of Jordan Rowe, Oli Newton, Ollie Barbaresi and Michael Cameron finished 11th out of nearly 150 teams. Jordan (15:51) and Ollie Barbaresi (15:52) were the quickest on the team. The TVH B team finished 46th with Hugo Cayssials (16:22) the quickest followed by Conor Kissane-Wood, Jake Hooley and Saif Saleh.
Our women’s team of Tasha Mundell, Lisa da Silva and Daisy Jowers finished just inside the top half of 106 teams with Lisa (11:37) the quickest over a 3km course.
Paulos Surafel and Chris Thomas, who have both been racing well this season in road and cross country races, travelled to Reading for the half marathon on Sunday 7th November. Paulos (pictured above) finished 3rd at the Reading half in 2019 and this time went one better in 2nd place knocking nearly a minute off his PB with a time of 63:18. Chris finished 14th in 68:17, just outside his PB of 68:08 from the Paddock Wood half marathon in September.