KFL Race 7 Swanley Park, March 16th 2014.

Start

Sevenoaks AC pipped at the post

Since last October eighteen teams from across the County have been contesting the Kent Fitness League  - a series of 7 gruelling cross Country races with 10 runners to score in each race.

After 6 races, Sevenoaks AC were in the lead  - just ahead of Dartford Harriers. Everything hinged on the 7th race, held last Sunday, March 16th.

Thirty-seven Sevenoaks AC runners travelled to Swanley for the race, which was held in glorious sunny conditions around the picturesque Swanley Park.

We knew that Dartford would field a strong team and that some of our top runners  - David Lee and David Ives - couldn't be there.

The Dartford team set off fast in a big group, but gradually our top runners, Allan Lee and Mike Fanning began to break through.

Allan Lee had a great run to finish second in 28.33, beaten only by Chris Wyles of New Eltham joggers who recorded an impressive 5th win of the series.

Then came the first of the Dartford runners, Andrew Pickett in 3rd, closely followed by three other Dartford runners in 5th, 6th, and 7th.

With a massive sprint finish, Mike Fanning came in 10th, and our other scorers not far behind - Andy Nicoll in 16th, Andy Ashlee in 23rd, Ben Bridges in 30th and Andrew Linney in 33rd,

It looks as though Dartford would win. However it wasn't over yet.
Each men's team must have one over-50 runner and Sevenoaks' Chris Desmond and John Stevens were well ahead of Dartford's leading M50.  John eventually beat Chris by one place to be our M50 scorer in 50th place, with Dartford's M50 in 99th place.

In the women's race Sevenoaks and Dartford were also head-to-head. Clare Reeves of Dartford was the winner in 32.22 mins followed by her team-mate 14 year old Chloe Sharp.
For Sevenoaks, Cath Linney came 4th, Heather Fitzmaurice 7th and Pauline Dalton 11th. With Dartford's 3rd runner placing 21st, Sevenoaks won the women's race.

Adding up all the points from the scoring runners, Dartford won the men's race with Sevenoaks 2nd. Sevenoaks won the women's race with Dartford 2nd.

In the series, it couldn't have been closer. With the best 6 races to count for the series, Dartford won by 104 points to 103.

However Sevenoaks AC can be very proud to be runners-up in such a tough competition. In each race the club has fielded between 30 and 40 runners – an impressive turnout for a small club – and has performed consistently well, placing in the top 3 combined teams in every race.

There have also been some outstanding individual performances: -

Chris Desmond  - M50 champion
Jim Fitzmaurice  - M70 champion
Heather Fitzmaurice – W40 - runner up

This is the club's best performance ever in the Kent fitness League.

Thanks go to Geoff Vine and Happy Fisher, our club cross-country captains for inspiring the team and to everyone who ran for the club.

The next task will be to beat Dartford in the 2014/15 season, which starts in October.


Jim Knight

The SAC results were:

Ov Pos
 
Lg Pos
 
Runner
 
Age
 
Time
 
Club
 
Rating
2 2 Allan Lee 41 28:33 Sevenoaks AC 99.44
10 10 Mike Fanning 46 30:35 Sevenoaks AC 94.94
16 16 Andy Nicoll 33 31:19 Sevenoaks AC 91.57
23 23 Andy Ashlee 44 32:03 Sevenoaks AC 87.64
31 30 Ben Bridges 34 32:39 Sevenoaks AC 83.71
34 33 Andrew Linney 46 32:55 Sevenoaks AC 82.02
35 34 Lee Lintern 33 32:55 Sevenoaks AC 81.46
46 45 Joe Parsons 23 33:53 Sevenoaks AC 75.28
49 48 James Wright 45 33:58 Sevenoaks AC 73.60
51 50 John Stevens 52 34:03 Sevenoaks AC 72.47
53 51 Chris Desmond 51 34:14 Sevenoaks AC 71.91
55 53 Adam Lesley 43 34:33 Sevenoaks AC 70.79
62 60 Daniel Witt 39 34:56 Sevenoaks AC 66.85
70 4 Cath Linney 44 35:35 Sevenoaks AC 95.38
76 7 Heather Fitzmaurice 44 35:57 Sevenoaks AC 90.77
91 11 Pauline Dalton 49 36:31 Sevenoaks AC 84.62
96 85 John Denyer 65 36:59 Sevenoaks AC 52.81
98 87 Andrew Rackham 40 37:08 Sevenoaks AC 51.69
100 89 Geoff Vine 66 37:18 Sevenoaks AC 50.56
102 91 Simon Bishop 50 37:26 Sevenoaks AC 49.44
103 92 Tony Horlock 53 37:27 Sevenoaks AC 48.88
107 95 Andy Evans 43 37:47 Sevenoaks AC 47.19
114 101 Sam Bennett 41 38:12 Sevenoaks AC 43.82
117 104 Duncan Cochrane 56 38:25 Sevenoaks AC 42.13
127 16 Judy Howells 37 39:25 Sevenoaks AC 76.92
129 113 Geoff Kitchener 64 39:36 Sevenoaks AC 37.08
140 120 Simon Hallpike 60 39:54 Sevenoaks AC 33.15
155 130 Martin White 46 40:50 Sevenoaks AC 27.53
166 139 Maurice Marchant 65 41:43 Sevenoaks AC 22.47
183 37 Silvia Forcat 37 42:56 Sevenoaks AC 44.62
185 39 Happy Fisher 37 43:08 Sevenoaks AC 41.54
209 47 Clair Thornton 39 45:54 Sevenoaks AC 29.23
216 166 Hugh Shewell 25 46:53 Sevenoaks AC 7.30
236 60 Sylvia Lewis 61 51:04 Sevenoaks AC 9.23
237 61 Rosie Draper 53 52:14 Sevenoaks AC 7.69

The full results are here.