Third place for Morpeth boys at English XC

They finished third out of 26 complete teams, with their four counters totting up a total of 87 behind competition winners The Judd School of Tonbridge in Kent (47points), with Abingdon School of Oxfordshire taking the runners up spot with 69 points.

Leading the King Edward squad home was sixth former Matthew Walton, who finished 15th and posted a time of 16m54s over the 5.3k distance. He was only thirty-six seconds adrift of event winner Harry Hewitt of Bourne Grammar School in Lincolnshire.

The King Edward scoring count was completed by Year 11s Will DeVere-Owen (20th) 17m08s, Ryan Davies (21st) 17m17s, and Liam Roche (24th) 17m21s, who just got home in front of team colleague James Tilley (25th) 17m22s. Bertie Marr completed the list of King Edward finishers in 35th place in 17m47s.

There was a total of 145 finishers in the Senior Boys event.

All of the KEVI squad are members of Morpeth Harriers & AC and all coached by veteran coach Mike Bateman.

Meanwhile Harriers Cat Macdonald and Anthony Janetta travelled over the Border at the weekend to take part in the Lindsays Scottish Athletics West District Cross Country Championships at Kilmarnock.

Running for Scottish club Bellahouston Road Runners, Macdonald had a fine run to come home in 1st place in a time of 31 minutes 58 seconds, some 13 seconds ahead of the 2nd place runner, with some 129 finishers.

In the Senior and Masters Men’s race, Janetta was 121st and 21st Masters competitor. Some 276 ran.

The club also had one representative in the Valencia Marathon, Shaun Land recording his first sub three hour run of 2:58:21.

Meanwhile, Blyth Running Club staged their 62nd Bklyth Sands Race on Sunday. Once again, the event attracted athletes from a large number of north east clubs and high winds and a high tide made for some testing conditions. Race winner was Stephanie McClean Dann of North Shields Poly, with Charlotte Dillon of Durham Harriers second and Michael Parkinson of North Shields third.