Not surprisingly, the headlines during the past weeks would have been given to Kevin McGee with all the club championship races ended, bar the national, all that remained were the extra events individually entered or earned.
The National Cross-Country Championships held at Parliament Hill fields, London, had a total entry of 4,000 for the three titles: Youths, juniors and seniors, being contested. Wallasey had entered a youth team, the first for many years, which finished in 49th position out of the 141 teams entered, the third team in the West Lancashire area to finish. Kevin McGee youth captain, led his team home in a highly creditable 110th position.
Kevin had earned a place in the Merseyside Schools team to contest the English Schools title at Redditch. He did this by entering himself in the Wirral schools races and qualifying for the Merseyside Schools races. His high placing here earned him his representative place for Merseyside. He performed extremely well, finishing first for Merseyside and helping them to finish in overall third position.
During this race he sustained a large gash on his leg which required hospital treatment, but this didn't seem to worry hirn during the track races at Kirkby, the following day. You may recall the somewhat blustery winds and sleet of two weeks ago, which encouraged the television sportsman to stay firmly implanted in his chair. In these conditions, Kevin ran a personal best 1,500 metres 4 min. 26.9 secs. finishing first in his event.
Many other track athletes chose this meeting to open the track season but, in the conditions, were content to compete rather than risk injury extending themselves to achieve good times.
To bring us up to date with the competitions one needs only mention last Sunday's Warrington A.C. cross-country relays. Steve D'Arcy ran extremely well in the young colts event to finish 25th. The colts relay team, 3 x 13/8 miles, were given an excellent start by Phil D'Arcy which came to nothing. Two boys only complete the course of the boys relay over the same distance, but ran in the wrong race and our two youth teams had an excellent battle of times in their race: it was obvious that it had been a long and well fought cross-country season .
Training has been modified in preparation for the track season, which opens on May 1 with the first Cheshire League clash at Hartford. The following week will set many re-visit Leamington Spa for, the Coventry Godiva meeting to be followed, on May 14, by the Cheshire Championships at Hartford. All results and details are, and will be, available from the secretary should more information be required.
A reminder to all members that the Annual General Meeting is on Thursday next and that help is required for marking the Northern Vets. Course on Sunday April 17, see Mr. Hewson, for details of this event.
Ends
Source - Wallasey News - Saturday, 09/04/1977
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