Y.X-C.L.(meeting 3) - 5.12.92 –Nunroyd park (Guiseley)

The third and final ‘Complete Runner West Yorkshire Cross Country League’ took place at a rain soaked Nunroyd Park, Guiseley on December 5th. The course was three laps of just under two miles and although quite flat, proved to be very testing due to the ankle deep quagmire on most of the course and a dangerous plunge into the parks’ fast flowing brook.

The cross country season is now in full swing and the major championships take place in the next few months (Northern in January, National in February). This meant that the competition between Spenborough runners to establish themselves in the squad for these races was intense.

At the front of the race, Batley based Andrew Pearson of Longwood Harriers made light work of the mud and won easily, while Spenboroughs’ top man Jeff Hornby continued his return to form with an excellent fourth place – this run lifted him to 3rd place overall in the league and gave him his first trophy of the season. Paul Dobson was the second Spen runner home in 11th place and would have had a third consecutive top ten placing but for a recurring stitch problem which forced him to stop with the finish just 400 yards away.


Further down the field, Spenborough runners produced some tremendous packing as less than a minute covered the next nine scorers. Improving Dave Sunderland stormed through the field into 31st, just beating Dave Baskerville who came 33rd and is almost back to his best after a long spell out injured.

Promising Junior Robert Moon in 35th and Alf Wolfenden in 39th had good runs to bring the Spenborough ‘A’ team into a brilliant 2nd place on the day and 3rd overall in the league behind Leeds and Rowntrees, but once again ahead of Longwood.

The Spenborough ‘B’ team which finished 9th on the day, was lead home by Myles Chandler in 46th (your man at the race and in it), then came ‘supervet’ Ray Padgett in 49th and road running ‘ace’ Darren Hanson in 50th, who found it hard to come to grips with the mud on his cross country debut.

Mick Dransfield showed that he is back to form in 55th place by beating below par Gary Damiani into 62nd place, whilst Tony Patchett (90th) and Frank Reddington (94th) don’t look like making the team for the Northern Championships, unless someone drops out between now and January 16th.

Other Spenborough finishers in the field of 238 runners included recently ill Kevin Bentley (174th), Graham Pearce (193rd), Derek Robinson (209th) and Harry Machin (237th). Once again Carl Wolfenden dropped out and needs to finish some races to regain his confidence.