This weekend Georgeham fielded its first ever team in the annual Gliddon and Squire North Devon Cross Country League. The league is open to children in year 4 and upwards and sees hundreds of children from local primaries, secondaries and the athletics clubs taking part in a series of meets throughout the winter. It is super friendly and welcoming to runners of all ages and abilities.

Evie, Elfini, Martha, Chloe and Sam all lined up on a grey and damp Sunday morning, joined by Josie and Owen, both running for North Devon Athletics. After a week of solid rain it was a proper wet and muddy cross country race – although the sun came out by the end! They all did brilliantly – finishing with huge grins on their faces and, in some cases, covered in mud! Martha, Evie and Elfini took on the under 9’s course and Chloe and Sam took on the slightly longer Under 11’s – the distances ranged from 1250 metres to 1750 metres. They all had to run one and a half laps of the field, followed by a steep climb, some more fields and a slippy section through the woods where they had to navigate tree roots and a lot of mud.

Martha: “It was muddy, fun and AWESOME”

Elfini: “It was exciting, I had butterflies at the start and was REALLY happy when I finished”

Chloe: “It was hard, muddy, steep and tricky but lots of fun!”

Sam: “Slipping and falling in the mud was awesome. I loved taking part, there were hundreds of kids from all different schools and clubs. The course was shorter than I expected but very muddy and slippy”.

Evie was the youngest in the team but had the biggest grin when she finished!

There are 5 more meets throughout the winter and we’d love to see our team grow. We need at least 3 runners per race for the points to count as a school team – the Under 9 Girls team are already placed 13th after just one event!

Thanks to Ali Smith for the photos, commentary and organising things, and to Ben Cox for helping out supporting!