North Eastern Counties Cross Country Championships Preview

As a direct result of finishing sixth in the Senior Men’s event at last week’s British Athletics UK Challenge Meeting  in Liverpool’s Sefton Park,
which also incorporated the European Trials,
Morpeth Harrier Jonny Taylor has made the GB Team
for the European Cross Country Championships, scheduled to take place in Toulon, Hyeres, France, this Sunday 13th December.


Whilst this is a great honour for Taylor, however unfortunately it means
that he will forced to miss the 110th annual North Eastern Counties Cross
Country Championships at East Park in Sedgefield on Saturday 12th December,
where he had been expected to defend the Senior Men’s title
that he won on Newcastle’s Town Moor twelve months ago.

It also means that his club will be missing one of their key performers
in defence of their team title, however they will still have leading performers
Nick Swinburn, Lewis Timmins, Carl Avery, Ross Floyd, Peter Newton,
Chris Smith and Thomas Straughan amongst their remaining line-up of talent,
and with these athletes at their disposal Morpeth will still be
a formidable act to watch in the Senior Men’s team stakes.

This is the first major Cross Country competition to be held at the
South Durham town for all of sixty years, with the last being the
Northern Championships in 1955, which were held at the Sedgefield Racecourse.

It also marks a great occasion, and much responsibility, for one of the
regions newest clubs Sedgefield Harriers, who are honoured to be given
the task of hosting the nine event programme,
which gets underway at 11.00am, with the Under 13 Boys 3k event.

The Senior Men’s 12k event, the longest event of the day, gets underway at 1.00pm.
Senior Women contest their 8.3k event at 1.55pm,
and action winds up at 2.30pm, when the Under 17 Men contest their 6.1k event.

In addition to the Senior Men Morpeth Harriers also have good chances
of medals in the Under 17 Men’s, Under 15 Boys, Senior Women’s, and Under 13 Girls events.

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