NESS XC Race 4 Results – with Intra-Club Results

29 January 2023 - By Ben O'leary

Support

It’s amazing when people come along to support these events, and I know that it does give a huge boost when you’re running to hear something other than “go on Harriers” when you’re struggling through the wind and mud.

Huge mention to:

• Angela Read
• Natalie Lilley, who helped recording scores so that Liz could run and take 3rd Witham Lady
• Mia Riley, who helped make sure I didn’t miss any Witham runners.

And a shout to all those bakers who make the event what it is:

• Rachel O’Leary (for the “rocket ship”)
• Jodee Mayer (bakes every time, even if she has no time to do so)
• James Montgomery (stepped in at the last minute with some outstanding millionaire shortbreads, I’ll be needing that recipe)
• Anita Grainger (for feeding the 5,000 on three different ginger bakes)
• Liz Stuckey (for making not one, but two cakes, and then mixing them together)

A lot of us go along to XC races and enjoy the treats. If you haven’t contributed a bake before, do please consider it for next time, or next season. You don’t have to be a master baker, just think of the audience :D.

Individual performances

Well done to our leading man and leading lady for today. Same as last time:

• Liz Stuckey, flying in at 20th Lady
• Heydon Mizon, after a short detour en route, arriving as 2nd Man

Heydon’s effort level was so high that after finishing he couldn’t even make it through the finisher’s funnel, causing a traffic jam to put the A12 to shame.

For full details look out for the weekly results post!

Team performance

In spite of our strong performance, and Heydon’s 2nd place finish, here’s how it’s looking:

POS	POOL A – MEN	TEAM SCORE
1	Colchester Harriers	112
2	Ipswich Jaffa	203
3	Great Bentley	252
4	Harwich	281
5	Witham	385
6	Mid Essex	610

 

POS	POOL A – WOMEN	TEAM SCORE
1	Colchester Harriers	33
2	Ipswich Jaffa	36
3	Great Bentley	57
4	Witham	125
5	Harwich	154
6	Mid Essex	276

Overall this puts us in 5th for today.

League-wise you will no doubt remember that we were a single point ahead of the Great Bentley Tortoises. With their third place finish today that means we have dropped to a single point behind them!

	LEAGUE POSITIONS
	POOL A	PTS
1	Colchester Harriers	24
2	Ipswich Jaffa	20
3	Great Bentley	14
4	Witham	13
5	Harwich	9
6	Mid Essex	4

It turns out trying to colour in the text in yellow ends up making it almost invisible, who would have thought it? Not important. What IS important is that if we can beat them in the final event, we have a shot at taking that third place finish.

The next event is 19th February, get it in the calendars if you haven’t already, especially if you’ve been a scoring man or lady in the past!

Intra-Club results

On reviewing the results for the series so far, we have spotted that there are too many who have signed up to teams but have never attended a race, or have only attended a single race. This can have a big impact with a number of “default” scores given to teams every single race when the teams were created to give a balanced competition. We have taken the decision at this stage to remove anyone from teams who have missed 3 or 4 of the races so far. The numbers speak for the impact these no-shows have had and now gives a much better reflection of how the teams have performed.

Apologies to anyone who has been removed, but I’m sure you will agree that’s it’s more fair on those who are showing up and putting in amazing performances for the team.

Congratulations to the Woodpeckers for taking race 4!

The Warthogs have still managed to claim a solid victory with their 2nd place finish today giving them an insurmountable lead over second place Woodpeckers. The competition is still hot for the remaining places, with Wallabies only a single point behind, and 2nd place is still within reach for Weasels if we see a strong performance at the final race!

Here’s how the actual team’s average performances now look with the adjusted teams:

The Weasels were pretty close to taking 2nd, and there were a couple of people finishing clustered together where the odd elbow could have made all the difference!