Written by MH   

Matt's upbeat report from Llovely Lloyd Park.

Full results - www.thepowerof10.info/results

Surrey League 2010/2011- Match 1 Report Lloyd Park, Croydon

Before the race began yesterday I was optimistic of a good result. The turnout had been very impressive, and, unusually for Lloyd Park, it wasn't actually that muddy and wet and the ground was quite stable underfoot. I wasn't disappointed, it was a great match.

First in for K&P was Richard Mathie (15th), who ran excellently and in terms of time wasn't that far away from the top ten. Good to see George Corcoran (19th) now able to run AND score at a Surrey League match; well done George, very good indeed.

There was very little between Craig Price (21st) and Andy Arbour (22nd), who were our next highest placed runners and who did a sterling job. And great to see the return to Cross Country of Jamie McCullagh (27th), who was followed by Matt Hyett (36th). Mike Maranzano seemed to be returning to form in 38th; don't expect it will be long before he is battling to be one of the first scorers.

Michael Huntley then followed in 50th, together with Tony McDowall (53rd) and an excellent debut from Philip Bearman (58th).

The fact that the next runners, Steve Wright and Peter Wilkins, didn't score despite their positions (65th and 81st) was indicative of how strong the team was. Completing the line up was Ant Budarkiewicz, new recruit Paul Fitcher, Bob McDonough and Dave Gibbons.

In the end we finished 3rd out of 9 teams, which is a great result. Many thanks to all who ran…who knows, if we get all runners out for the next couple of races we could find ourselves pushing for promotion!

Next up is the Bank of England match at Richmond Park on 23rd October. Following that it is the Club 7 on 6th November(2pm start). The big one though is 13th November which is the next Surrey League match at Wimbledon Common - looking forward to that one already.

Matt