Cornwall Schools Cross Country runners triumphed in the mud and torrential rain at last Saturday’s South West Schools Cross Country Championships held at Truro School.

The county can now boast a quartet of South West Champions: Katie Hughes (Senior Girls), Finn Birnie (Intermediate Boys), Grace Brock (Intermediate Girls) and Maisy Luke (Minor Girls), with Intermediate Boys and Senior Girls also crowned as South West team champions.

Hughes, who attends Helston Community College, continued her run of good for this winter, producing a top rated performance of powerful running in the treacherous under foot conditions, leading from the start, gradually increasing the gap over her pursuers and crossing the line eighteen seconds ahead of team mate Sian Temple (Wadebridge School). The Cornish one-two, together with ninth placed Olivia Walklett (Truro School) laid the foundation for a possible the first ever team title in this age group, ahead of Somerset and Devon.

In the Intermediate Boys 5700 metre event the Truro School pair, Finn Birnie and Harris Mier led the field from the start but Sam Gentry (Avon) had no intention of letting the two English Schools International runners have things all their own way, on their home course, challenging them from the outset. It was not until the third and final lap that Birnie eventually broke clear to claim the individual title by sixteen seconds, with Gentry, courtesy of a stronger final few hundred metres, taking the runner’s up prize, with Mier third.

Not surprisingly with excellent support from Penryn College’s Floyd Ratcliffe (9th), Kristof Klimek (10th), another Helston youngster Jacob McAlone (11th) and a rejuvenated Archie Vingoe (19th), the Cornish team were comfortable winners in the team competition, ahead of Avon and Gloucestershire.

Eleven year old Maisy Luke (Richard Lander) continued her outstanding cross country season, following on from a magnificent third place in the Under 13 race at the previous weekend’s South of England Championships in London, by coasting to victory in the Minor Girls race at Truro School.

Front running Maisy successfully adopted her usual ‘catch me if you can’ tactic, never being headed from gun to tape and winning the South West title by a comfortable eighteen second margin.

In the Intermediate Girls race, Grace Brock (Mounts Bay Academy) showed that she is now back to her best after feeling a little below par in recent weeks, storming around the 4000 metre waterlogged course in the final race of the day, to deservedly lift the Intermediate Girls South West title. Another Mount’s Bay Academy runner Imogen Wood was the second Cornish runner across the line in eighth position.

There were also top ten finishes for Bradley McLellan (Newquay Tretherras School), who finished fourth in the Junior Boys race, Zac Clemens ({Penryn College) who was fifth in the Minor Boys race and Helston Academy’s Tom Slattery who was ninth in the Senior Boys event.

Key For Schools: FAL Falmouth School, HEL Helston Community College, MULL Mullion School, PEN Penryn College.

Other Local Runners

Minor Girls: 11 Erin Devery PEN 8.21, 63 Abbie Downing PEN 9.36. Minor Boys: 13 James Horton FAL 10.12, 66 Ben Stevens PEN 11.48. Junior Girls: 25 Catherine Groves HEL 14.51, 61 Rebecca Benney HEL 16.31. Junior Boys: 58 Edward Mitchell PEN. Intermediate Girls: 54 Nell Packer FAL 17.40. Intermediate Boys: 56 Sam Goodchild PEN 22.52. Senior Girls: 21 Nell Savage MULL 19.41. Senior Boys: 54 James Williams HEL 27.10.