TVH impress at the new Met League Course

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It was a great turn out from the TVH SENIOR LADIES team at the second Met League fixture. There were 249 women who completed the course, a field which, for this race only, included the Cambridge University XC team. The new venue hosted a complicated course which was undulating and muddy in parts. 

First home for TVH was Stephanie Ainley (15th, 23:18) continuing her excellent start to the season. Kate Olding was next to finish from TVH (22nd, 23:42); as well as scoring loads of points for the senior team in this race, Kate also finished 5th in the U20 race. Lisa da Silva finished strong in 35th (24:43). 

Siana and Lara were next to finish in 103rd (27:06) and 121st (27:56). Frankie Lynch finished 180th (30:37) closely followed by Kirstie Tew in 185th (30:50). Cate Robinson (229, 35:19) had another successful XC race for TVH (229, 35:19) and Christine Munden finished the team in 234th (36:05).

The TVH SENIOR MEN lined up to a new course at Stanborough Park and the addition of a team from Cambridge University ensured a new Met League record of 529 starters in Saturday’s Met League race at Welwyn Garden City. The course consisted of 3 large laps plus 3 loops around hilly and undulating grassland and woodland throughout the park. Thankfully overnight rain had disappeared and hadn’t left too much mud on the course and the going was mostly firm underfoot. There were challenges on the course including a long drag across a slope at the end of each lap and not far from the start the course funnelled into a thin footpath creating a bottleneck for those not brave or fast enough to be at the front.
Leading the way for the Valley men Conor Kissane-Wood continues his return to form and was first Valley man home in 61st (26:25), closely followed by U20 athlete Abdi Mohamed in 64th (10th U20!) in 26:28. Andrew Mitchell the defending TVH Met League Cup Handicap champion rounded out the top 100 and was first Valley Vet home in 100th (27:34).Calum Nicol had Andrew in his sights at 116th (27:54) finishing ahead of a group of 4 battling Valley men. Fergus Johnson had a close tussle with fellow Imperial student Lewis Jackson, with Fergus coming out on top at 160th (28:45), and Lewis just 5 seconds behind for a good TVH debut performance in162nd (28:50). They were closely followed by Naol Abagibe in 168th also scoring good points for the vets (28:58), while Todd Oates showed good form on his Met League debut to finish just one second behind in 169th (28:59).

Hugo Dias continues his resurgence and finished 222nd (29:55), with another Imperial man and U20 athlete, Jack McKeon, making good on his Met League debut in 272nd (31:06) with vet Greg Bennett nursing some bruised ribs to finish 328th (32:53). A trio of Valley vets completed the team led by Richard Bell in 441st (36:06) with Bernie Robbins 4 seconds behind in 445th (36:10) and David Ford finishing in 449th (36:23) for an excellent team performance.

The senior men finished 2nd team overall in Division 2 and the Veteran men finished joint 2nd in Division 2, meaning after 2 races this leaves both the TVH Senior Men and Veteran Men on top of Division 2!

 
Thank you to all who turned up on Saturday, it’s been a brilliant start to the competition. With the chasing teams in Division 2 not far behind we will need to get everyone out for the next Met League race at Uxbridge on Saturday December 2nd to make sure we are still top at Christmas.
 

There is also the Met League Cup to play for (please see latest scores attached, thanks Phil for compiling this)

Another incentive to do well in the next Met League race is that it will be the TVH CHRISTMAS PARTY on the evening following the race, and it would be good to celebrate being top of Division 2 at Christmas!

The date for the Christmas party is Saturday December 2nd.
At the Queen’s Head pub, 13 Brook Green, Hammersmith, W6 7BL.

The party will begin at 7pm and there will be a charge of £12 per person for the food, everyone is invited including those racing and those not racing, if you can confirm as soon as possible so that we can confirm the numbers for the party.

See you at Uxbridge and Hammersmith on December 2nd