Good day of XC today.

Ladies up first, Gemma Steel (Charnwood) taking the win by 12 seconds from our Julie Emmerson.... if the race had been over the usual hilly route i think Julie would have took the honours.

In similar fashion, Charnwood took the team gold over Cov by what must have only been a matter of 2 or 3 points... Bristol & West with the bronze.

In the men's, i haven't seen results yet, but i think we were 5th team. Looked close between Notts AC and Bristol & West for the win, BRAT 3rd, Tipton pipping us to 4th place.

As to my own performance, well having suffered with a cold all week i wasn't expecting much, and ran 43:22 for what was a couple of hundred metres over 10km, on an undulating and sticky surface, with plenty of twists and turns, and little ditches to negotiate. I expect my cough/cold didn't actually make much more than 60-90secs difference, as there's no way i'd be running close to 40mins for 10km on that surface.