Uxbridge Met League XC, 3 Dec 2022

Cross country has been a long favourite of mine and I love every race, the tougher the better. The Uxbridge course, is an absolute cracker. It has everything a cross country course needs, mud, hills (abandoned dry ski slope hill!), winding and flowing wooded single track, and of course my favourite, a crossing of the river Pinn!

My usual game plan for cross country is to go hard from the gun and get a good position to avoid getting held up in any early bottlenecks, Uxbridge begins with a section in open grass field so a good opportunity to accelerate hard and do exactly this. After this it is into the ski slope hill, being a smaller athlete I usually manage up climbs without too much trouble today was no different, working my way past others flagging with the steep gradients. After a steep descent down the other side the race had just thinned out enough for the wooded single track section. By this time I was in a good position with men of a similar pace both in front and behind. Once through the wood it is onto the highlight of the race, the river crossing. I love this section, many athletes take caution through here as it is quite a steep drop into the river and a steep bank out the other side. My method involves going full gas and taking as few steps as possible in the water! Next the course loops round some more field section and restarts for more of the same on lap 2.

Running with Highgate is always great as there are teammates everywhere and today was no exception. This always provides a great mental boost and reminds me that I am running to score team points. In the final straight I managed to push hard and pass a few other athletes for a strong finish. I managed to finish 62nd overall and 12th in the club, rounding out the A team. I am very happy with the result given the strong competition!

David Shepherd