Met League: out with a bang!

Despite the lowest turnout for the Met League this season we managed some very good team results, and some good individual ones, to wrap up the season. Next up: Nationals!

Our chief Met League correspondent and coordinator, Michael Davidson, filed this report from a holiday in Copenhagen:

I'm not going to let a little vacation get in the way of writing up this race report. It's just too good to let someone else do it. Sorry, this is a really long one.

When I first heard about all the people not running this weekend, I had a bit of a panic.  But, except in one case, it was not necessary.  Overall, we had some really good team results (and some good individual ones) despite the lowest turnout for the Met League this season.
In the U17 Men, James had a good finish (8th), which is even better considering he's U15 (and in fact, he was the 3rd U15 man).
Despite lacking our top runner, the Senior Women's team managed their best finish of the year in 2nd.  Coupled with beating Highgate at the last fixture, the women have at least once in the five races, beaten all of the other teams head to head.  Though I think we should revel in their 4th overall finish this year, it is entirely possible that next year we make a challenge for the top spot. Anyway, amazing races by several individuals to help this result in Sue's absence.  Good work everyone who did manage to show up.

The men were also shorthanded, though thankfully Tom decided that even though his plane landed at Gatwick at 11am on Saturday, he would still make the race only a few hours later.  And to top that all off, he did manage another high finish, 12th this time.  Our Men were bolstered by a few first timers this race, which helped since they were in the scoring 12.  We were missing a lot of men for various reasons (myself included, though I was present) but still managed to beat a (depleted - sorry, it's the truth) Highgate squad.  But a win is a win and 3rd overall is pretty amazing.  There is a lot to look forward to for next year (and perhaps at the Nationals as well).  4th overall (for what has been said is the "most improved team in the Met League this season") is a strong showing and everyone who helped out in that deserves to be proud.  Some wonderful individual results when the team needed them the most.  Check out all those finishes in the 40s, 50s and 60s!

Our Veteran Men's team, once again, won the league, and I would imagine this will continue.  Our C team won division 3, so let's do our best to have not only an A and a B team in Division 1 next year, but also a C team.  Wouldn't that be something....

Now comes the hard part of the writeup.  I was hoping to be able to say: we won both the vets team prizes.   I can say the three vet women who showed up did try their hardest.  But we were shorthanded by a lot in this division and our small lead disappeared.    We dropped to 3rd, though I think we were lucky to even have finished that high as we were 7th on the day.

Thank you to everyone who came out to support the team (who was that good-looking person with the cowbell?) and take pictures.  Everything you do to help makes it a much more meaningful and fun event.  It would be very boring running around a field in the mud just for the fun of it.  And that goes for everyone who has come out to any of the races.

The good news is that no teams were relegated (and I think the better news is that we knew that a while ago).  So without further delay, here are the raw numbers, teams first:

Met League #5, Horsenden Hill, 11/02/2012

Young Athletes
U13 Boys
No team this week, finished 14 of 21 teams

U13 Girls
No team this week, finished 8 of 16 teams

U17 Men
6th of 14 teams this week, finished 8th of 20 teams

U17 Women
4th of 11 teams this week, finished 7th of 19 teams

Senior Women
A team was 2nd in Division 1 and finished 4th overall (note, we were 2nd by 1 point, so if any of you ladies outkicked someone or passed a WGEL runner, that was the difference, or if you held one off too).
B team was 7th in Division 2 (only 8 teams) and also finished 4th overall

Veteran Women
A team was 7th in Division 1 and finished 3rd overall
B team was non existant, but still (somehow) managed to win Division 2 and will be in Division 1 next year

Senior Men
A team was 3rd in Division 1 and finished 4th overall
B team was 3rd in Division 2 and finished 4th overall (no, that's not a typo, they are supposed to be the same)

Veteran Men
A team was 1st in Divison 1 and finished 1st overall
B team was 4th in Divison 1 and finished 6th overall
C team was 2nd in Division 3 and finished 1st overall (by a lot! and we get promoted as I said above)

Individual Results

Young Athletes
U17 Men
8th James Wooldridge 12:59
19th Miron Woldemichael 13:50
32nd Iziaih Turner 16:02
35 Total Finishers

U17 Women
11th Lily Beckford 15:47
13th Genevieve Weston 15:49
25 Total Finishers

Senior Women
9th Sarah Swinhoe 23:01
17th Claire Morrissey 23:52
20th Katharine Daish 24:06
32nd Edie Fassnidge 24:50
41st Jackie Wastell 25:31
53rd Fiona Alston 26:28
68th Elspeth Storrer 27:48
69th Katherine Vinnicombe 27:52
101st Alison Harrow 34:18
103 Finishers

Senior Men
12th Tom Aldred 29:16
43rd George Stewart 31:26
47th Matt Convery 31:32
50th Martin Potter 31:40
51st Dan Madams 31:40 (wish I could have seen that finish)
53rd Graham Russ 31:45
55th Steve Monaghan 31:53
68th Chris Hartley 32:19
69th Key Gadd 32:22
75th Robert Grech 32:34
89th Paul Lemmon 33:02
104th Andy Welshman 33:44
113th Anthony Hall 34:13
117th James Pickett 34:19
118th Matt Fassnidge 34:19 (again?)
122nd Howard Gold 34:23
125th Andy Owen 34:31
127th Jacob Howe 34:32
129th Norman Micthell 34:36
146th Dan McKeown 35:43
147th Will Whittaker 35:43 (ok, this is the third time)
150th Anthony Wilkinson 35:53
159th Phil Hogg 36:17
175th Stuart Amblin 37:23
178th Mark George 37:38
189th George Margesson 38:12
201st Russell Weston 38:42
228th Jim Hickie 41:16
252nd Ken Towsen 45:08
256th Robert Gould 45:43
267 Finishers Total

For more from Michael, including “The Last Word” and an announcement of his departure from the UK (and the Northern Hemisphere) in April, please keep your eyes peeled for Heathside news landing in your inbox and take a moment to read it. We owe our thanks to Michael for encouraging us to put on a great show this season. In his honour he gets the feature photo, despite injury preventing him from running. If I had a photo of him with his cowbell I’d use that one … anyone?