19 Walton athletes braved the cold and the glutinous mud of Lloyd Park in Croydon to compete in the country champs with some success.

The under 13 boys were first off with James Bradshaw 11th, Ben Kennard 21st and Harry Marchbank 25th in a race with 87 finishers. Had Walton had a 4th runner they would probably have won medals in the team race, certainly if the race was three to score Walton would have come second to Aldershot. Lets try to turn a few more out next year.

In a field of almost 60 under 13 girls there were good runs from Rachel Strachan  29th and Kim Dawkins 38th.

The under 15 boys race saw the best individual performance from Alex Ferrelly who came 3rd to claim the club’s first individual medal for a few years. Jack Marchbank finished 42nd.

Patrick O’Callaghan had a good run for 9th place in the under 17 men’s race with Alexander Aylett 30th.

Claire Pearce came 5th in a small field of under 20 women and John Redshaw was 7th of 26 in the under 20 men’s event.

For the senior women Nathalie Warren continued her good season with 38th and Jo Locker came 50th on what she considers to be her least favourite course. 

While the senior men’s team could not match their silver medal achievement of last year , missing two of last years scoring six,  they performed very creditably for 5th place of the 18 clubs who fielded complete teams.  James Harvey led the way in 11th place followed home by Robin Copestick 32nd, John Marsden 52nd, Richard Drew 61st, Steve Mills 87th and Phil Bearman 102nd, Phil still finished in the top half of a very large field. 

Full results can be found on the Surrey AA website
County Champs Results