MAC juniors refuse to get bogged down by weather

Maidenhead Athletic Club’s juniors produced some excellent performances in difficult, boggy conditions at the first Border League Cross Country event of the season at Lightwater Country Park this weekend.

Best performance of the day came from Sophie McLachlan, who was first in the u15s girls’ race, and there were several other top 10 finishes, with Bea Francis coming seventh in the u9s girls race and Toby Smith ninth in the u15s boys’ event. Maidenhead are set to host the next cross country event in the series on Sunday, December 4.

Eight of MAC’s u11s juniors also competed in the sports hall trials at Thames Valley Athletic Centre this week and all of them did amazingly well. Alice Greenland’s performances stood out as she finished first in all five of her events, including the triple jump which she won by 47cms.

Olivia Donnelly came second in four of her events while Sofia D'Orazio came first in the one-lap obstacle course and was joint second with Varsha Vishak in the Hi Stepper.

Varsha was also third in the one lap hurdles, while Diva Ganta produced a speedy performance in the hi stepper to finish in first.

Ava Koldashi and Ariana Kumar both threw well and excelled in the chest push, coming joint second in both. Atiksh Kumar was the club’s only male competitor, but he also excelled in his five events.

A ‘small army’ of MAC runners made light of the poor conditions to race in the Marlow Half or Marlow 7 on Sunday.

First home for the club over an undulating course was Jon Regan in the 7mile race. He was fourth overall and second in his MV40 age category in a time of 41.34.

Adam Bennett was sixth and Craig West eighth, who along with Stephen Francis in 13th helped MAC to first place in the team event

(fastest four finishers).

Sarah Simms was first female home for MAC and the 14th female finisher in a time of 55.27.

Pauline Siddons added yet another trophy to her cabinet as the winner of the FV70+ category, finishing in a chip time of 1:08:15.

Becky Atkinson led the MAC runners in the half marathon, finishing 27th overall and was the third female finisher. She also won the FV40 age category race in 1:28:26. Not too far behind was Elliot Jones in 49th position in a time of 1:33:32.

MAC runners also completed the New York marathon this weekend, with Alejandro del Campo finishing in an impressive 3:30:55, Mel Tudor in 4:19:33, Chris Sutton in 4:56:19 and Elisa Harris in 5:19:13.