The 2019/20 Hampshire League came to a conclusion yesterday, with the final match at Popham. In near perfect, calm weather before the storm and with no mud in sight, the Reading AC women took 1st, 2nd and 3rd places (jess Gibbon, Naomi Mitchel and Anna Boniface) in their final race, to win team Gold for the first time! Jess also won the individual gold, with Naomi in Silver and U20 Georgia Hayes in joint 3rd overall and gold in the U20s. The Vets Women team also finished the season in 2nd place and Sarah Urwin-Mann won the individual Vet award.

The men’s team finished 4th in the final race and 4th for the season, with Dan Thorne saving his best run to last and finishing 3rd yesterday.

Reading also had success in the girls races with Naomi Harris winning the U17 race, finishing 2nd individual overall and the U17 team (Naomi Harris, Lara Tolson and Oonagh O’Driscoll) winning on the day and winning gold for the season. Unfortunately the U17 men didn’t have a complete team yesterday, but Laurie Baker and Issac Mileham represented the club well and the team finished 4th for the season.

In the U15 girls race Reading packed well in 4th, 5th and 6th (Ella Newman, Holly Haldene and Evie Elson), but unfortunately Southampton had 1st, 2nd and 3rd, so we were 2nd and 2nd for the season. In the U15 boys, Oli Snoxall had a strong run to finish 5th, the team were 6th and 6th for the season.

The U13 girls finished 5th team yesterday and 4th for the season. The U13 boys were only represented by one runner yesterday, Jacob Sheikh who finished 29th. The team finished 6th for the season.

Well done to everyone who has been racing in the mud and rain this season, especially those not named above who help the team even when not counting, as backup runners and pushing other team’s runners further back. Let’s have more boys out racing next season to keep up with the girls!