Southlanders win five medals at NZ cross country champs

It was a tale of young and old but some might object to the word old as inappropriate, so we’ll refer to it as a tale of youth and experience. 

We are talking about the New Zealand Crosscountry Champs, Taupo where the youngest and oldest grades gave Southland its medals, 4 gold and a silver.

Then the following day the Queenstown club, with a little help from St Pauls, gained a silver and bronze in the team’s relays.

First up was U14 girls 3000m with Southland and Otago crosscountry champs winner Abby O’Boyle running in her first national event.  The 13-year-old lead out but with 400m left to run she’d dropped to fifth.   But a withering sprint over the final 200m propelled from no medal to silver. 

What the girls can do the boys can do better – well so it seemed as Max McGregor of the Gore club convincingly took U14 gold in an impressive performance.   Both O’Boyle and McGregor are year 8 at school so should make next year’s national secondary school champs something to look forward to.

Now for the experienced.  Sarah Douglas finished 2nd overall in the masters women’s 6km race but it was enough to take the W35 gold medal by over 2 minutes.  In the W60 grade Debbie Telfer took the gold with a 4-minute advantage over second.  And the M60 8km race went to Gore stalwart and coach Ricky Gutsell by almost a minute.

That wasn’t the end of Southland medal winning.   Queenstown Club with Gareth Harcombe, Sarah Douglas, Sammy Fookes and Benny Britton were third in the senior relay while Jude Deaker, Kennedy Taylor, Siena Mackley and James McLeay gold in the U18 relay.

While not on the podium in the individual championship races, Harcombe. Britton Mackley, McLeay, Fookes Buddy Small and Lewis Blay placed well and showed Southland runners are more than competitive right through the grades at national level.

An appropriate comment was put on the Southland Development Squad (for Southland’s most promising up and coming young athletes) FB page: “As an indication that there’s plenty of running ahead of you and hopefully an inspiration to our talented Development Squad members, Southland gained 3 golds in the masters races plus ex squad member Hannah Miller, 3rd Senior Womans. If these people are anything to go by there is a lot for you to look forward to.”