Sevenoaks AC came away with five medals from the Kent AA Veterans Cross Country Championships in bright, still but cold conditions at Sparrows Den, West Wickham on Saturday 6th December. James Graham bagged two of the medals with individual bronze in the M60 event while leading John Denyer and Geoff Kitchener to team silver.

And SAC's sole female competitor at the championships, Sally Shewell, finished with the bronze medal against a strong field in the W55 event.

The first race of the day, over a testing ten kilometre course, was for the M50s - men aged 50 to 59. Chris Desmond, Keith Dowson and John Stevens, last year's bronze medallists, were supported by Ted Scott, Duncan Cochrane and Richard Thomas . Chris and Keith were well to the fore from the off as they worked hard to stay in touch with the leaders in a competitive race, while the other SAC runners scrapped for places further down the field. The winner was Ben Reynolds of Tonbridge AC, as Chris finished eighth, Keith twelfth and John thirty-first, leaving Sevenoaks agonisingly four points short of the bronze medals in fourth place. Ted Scott was forty-fifth, Duncan Cochrane forty-seventh and Richard Thomas sixty-second.

Last year, Sevenoaks' M60 - men aged 60 to 69 - team were only one point off the bronze medals, but with Lyndon Collins and Geoff Vine replaced by James Graham and John Denyer, they made no mistake this year with second place. James led them home in third, followed by John in eleventh and Geoff twenty-fifth over the five kilometre version of the course. Simon Hallpike also ran finishing in thirty-second place as Alan Newman of Paddock Wood AC took gold. That race was run together with all the women's races, including the W55 - women aged 55 to 64 - in which Sally Shewell had an excellent run to take that third place in a race won by Barbara Wenman of Canterbury Harriers.


The final race of the day was for the M40 men, aged 40 to 49. Sevenoaks had just two runners in this event on the day, Andrew Mead and Martin White. Andrew finished thirty-second, with Martin seventy-first, as the race was won by Chris Greenwood of Kent AC.

The Sevenoaks AC results were:

3 269 Sarah Shewell 00:25:09 Female W55 Sevenoaks AC

3 122 James Graham 00:21:06 Male M60 Sevenoaks AC
11 121 John Denyer 00:22:39 Male M65 Sevenoaks AC
25 124 Geoffrey Kitchener 00:24:56 Male M65 Sevenoaks AC
32 123 Simon Hallpike 00:26:09 Male M60 Sevenoaks AC

8 60 Christopher Desmond 00:36:24 Male M50 Sevenoaks AC
12 61 Keith Dowson 00:36:50 Male M50 Sevenoaks AC
31 63 John Stevens 00:40:00 Male M50 Sevenoaks AC
45 62 John Scott 00:42:52 Male M55 Sevenoaks AC
47 59 Duncan Cochrane 00:43:21 Male M55 Sevenoaks AC
62 64 Richard Thomas 00:52:27 Male M55 Sevenoaks AC

32 357 Andrew Mead 00:37:59 Male M45 Sevenoaks AC
71 359 Martin White 00:49:07 Male M45 Sevenoaks AC

The full results are here.

Nineteen SAC runners attended the fourth KFL match near Deal, with Keith Dowson and Pauline Dalton leading the teams home. Sevenoaks' veterans had a good day, in particular Keith first M50, Chris Desmond 2nd M50, Pauline 3rd W45, Glenda Goscomb 2nd W55. James Graham 1st M60 and Geoff Kitchener 2nd M65.

The men's team were 4th on the day, the women 8th and the combined team 4th. After four races, SAC's men, women and combined team are all 4th in the standings. The SAC results were as follows:

Ov Pos

Lg Pos

Runner

Age

Time

Club

Rating

The full results are here.

Despite the terrible weather on Sunday, an intrepid bunch of Sevenoaks AC runners, 23 strong, went to Eltham to run nearly 6 miles in the most awful underfoot conditions, writes Geoff Vine.

The usual 18 teams with 384 runners from across Kent took part, slipping and sliding, sometimes falling into the mud. Streams were rivers and hills were like mountains of ice. Luckily not really cold, but just very wet.

For the Sevenoaks men first to "swim" back  was 51 year old Chris Desmond in 25^th place (1^st M50) in a time of 35mins 53 secs. A fantastic run.

Andy Nicoll hung onto Chris for 28^th place in 36.10. Close behind was Andy Ashlee 40^th in 37.05 and Lee Lintern came 45^th in 37.43. New member John O’Callaghan was 58^th in 38.31. James Wright came 62^nd in 38.39 and last scorer for the men was Daniel Witt in 38.57 for 70^th place.

One really notable performance came from new recruit James Graham who at 61 years was 106^th in 41.02 for 1^st M60 and long time club member John Denyer took 1^st M65.

Overall the men’s team were 5^th in the race and climbed up one place in the season's rankings to 5^th. More to come from them yet, to climb even higher.

For the Sevenoaks ladies, injury and commitments impacted performance with only 6 ladies present. They achieved 10^th place on the day, but dropped to 3^rd in the table for the season.

First home was Katie Wills in 18^th place with 43.51. Pauline Dalton (21^st) showed she is coming back to form with 3^rd W50 in 44.02 and Sally Shewell (2^nd W55) was very happy with 47.39 and 43^rd place.

Overall the combined team are 5^th this year. The full Sevenoaks AC results were:

Ov Pos

Lg Pos

Runner

Age

Time

Club

Rating

The full results are here. The next race is on 30^th November at Fowlmead near to Deal.

Keith Dowson and myself ran the half marathon on 16 November, writes Dan Witt. Race started and finished from the Mercure hotel near Leeds Castle and went up the north downs in a steep climb between 3 and 5 miles then there was a sharp decent back towards the A20, a few loops through Harrietsham then back to the finish where we started.

The race came up slightly short for me at 12.91 miles but not as short as it was for Keith as he and the first 5 other runners missed a mile loop so I believe they were disqualified! My original finish as per the print out given to me at the finish was 12th in 1:29.12 but this may have been upgraded if indeed the first 6 were DQ’d. The race was a bit of a shambles to be honest, but a good work out and training run all the same.

In the official results, Dan Witt is fifth in 1:29:12, and Keith Dowson unplaced in 1:15:43. Picture is from the Kent Online website.