THE cross country season continued apace for athletes from Dudley Kingswinford Running Club with the men travelling to Gloucester for the second fixture of the Birmingham League and the women venturing to Northampton for their West Midlands League meeting.

With a total of seventeen making the journey south, the men put out a strong team in Division Two.

DK performed well with Ben Foster leading them home in 15th in 31.44, Kevin Duckworth finishing in 65th in 33.58, Rob Sannwald in 79th in 34.29, Matt Biggs in 108th in 35.35, James Wright in 125th in 36.29 and Dave Norman in 127th in 36.32 making up the A team scorers.

Mark Gatenby was 141st in 37.05, Steve Wood 148th in 37.27, Simon Hughes was 155th in 37.50, Daren Thompson was 159th in 37.58, Pete Hood was 169th in 38.26, Paul Richards was 182nd in 39.07, Mark Judge was 183rd in 39.10, Kieran Pitt was 186th in 39.20, Graham Wildgoose was 205th in 40.36 and Richard Tonks was 206th in 40.41. Paul Silk unfortunately had to drop out after two laps due to injury.

The performance was enough for DK to rank 14th of the 18 teams competing on the day and places them 13th in the league with two fixtures remaining.

Survival in the second division is by no means certain but similar performances in the final two fixtures could be enough to maintain a second division status.

At Northampton, a reduced women’s team came 20th of the 28 teams competing in Division Two with Rebecca Warren first back in 159th in 24.57, Marie Latreche was 202nd in 26.46, Lynn Sprague was 206th in 26.54, Sarah Cox was 217th in 27.36, sally McConville was 230th in 28.33, Alison Whitehouse was 232nd in 28.43, Sue Payton was 244th in 29.37 and Meg Dowen was 253rd in 30.27.