As part of the Stragglers Summer Grand Prix the club also takes part in the Surrey Road League, which is a team and individual competition against 34 other clubs in the area. In the team competition it really is focussed on ‘the sharp end’ with the first 3 runners from each club comprising the scoring team.

This year the Stragglers focussed on 6 of the Surrey League Road races (all included in Summer Grand Prix) with the best five scores from the races listed below to count.

Last year the Stragglers had finished very well in the competition with the men and ladies finishing seventh and fourth in the competition respectively but with the club targeting further progression this year.  So how did we do?

In summary this year’s results were excellent, the men doing extremely well but the ladies doing even better…read on

Men’s Team Competition

The men overall managed to move up to fifth place one point behind Guildford and Godalming in 4th place and only 4 points behind third placed Clapham Chasers.  This finishing position is the men’s highest since 2014 illustrating the club’s progression over the last couple of years.  Even more impressive considering some of the clubs we beat overall including South London Harriers, Reigate Priory, Striders of Croydon, Windmilers, Epsom & Ewell Harriers to name but a few.

In the team performance 10 different men featured in the scoring teams with 5 different Straggler men being the leading performer.  Rob Wilcox, Jim Lurkins and Richard Baggott all feature in the scoring 3 at various points, as might be expected, given their form this season in the club Grand Prix. Special mention must go to Jonathan Ormerod, Oliver Bowers, Paul Bowden who also featured in scoring teams this year. A very warm welcome to Pete Gregorowski and Tim Haughian who made an instance impact for the club being first Stragglers over the line in their respective races. Lastly a special mention to Matt Coakes, who found time between his various ultra-marathons to feature 3 times in the top 3 in the road league this season. 

Ladies Team Competition

The ladies managed to do even better than the men this year.  The season had started off strongly at the Richmond Half but got even better at the Dorking 10 mile, Elmore 7, Elmbridge 10k and Wimbledon 5k and in the process the ladies accelerated past Clapham Chasers and Ranelagh Ladies to finish runners up in the whole competition only to the all-conquering Guildford & Godalming AC. This is the ladies highest finishing position in the Surrey Road League since 2012.

Across the season 7 different ladies feature in the scoring top 3. As would be expected, Sarah Winter features heavily finishing first in the 4 Surrey League races she took part in. Both Liz Killip and Heidi Russenberger performed very well managing 4 appearances in scoring teams each this year but special mention must be made for Sophie Biggs who featured 3 times in the Surrey League and was the first Straggler lady over the line at Wimbledon and twice runner up to Sarah Winter. Phyllis Flynn and Helen Davies managed 1st and 3rd Straggler lady at the Richmond Half in the early part of the season. Lastly Juliet Cleghorn must be mentioned for her 3rd placed Straggler performance at Dorking despite only ever having run a 10 mile race once before, so more 10 mile races for you Juliet! Finally a further mention must be given to Liz Killip, who not only contributed so well to the team performance, but also won the overall individual F55 Surrey award ‘the Venus Rosewater dish’.

Well done to both the Ladies and Men on a great season. 

The full team table is included below and see the link to the Surrey Road League website for a full analysis of the results.