Central Athletic Club took top accolades at the East District Cross Country Championships at Aberdeen as their teams won the Senior Mens’, Senior Womens’ and Under 17 Ladies titles. 

Central AC Senior men

Morag MacLarty’s form continues to strengthen as she led the Womens’ Team and regain the trophy she has won three times previously, whilst the Men took their twelfth title in thirteen years.

Jamie Crowe is starting to write his own headlines and here he led home Central’s Senior Mens’ team with an individual Bronze medal

Jamie Crowe

performance, covering the 9.7 kilometre course in a tasty 29min 52secs.  Excellent packing from Dale Colley (sixth; 30.22), Cameron Milne (seventh; 30.29) and Michael Wright (eighth; 30.43) laid the foundation for the team title but it required top performances from Scott Green (28^th; 33.04) and fourth placed Master’s runner Scott Brember (43^rd; 33.57) to take the Team title by a narrow margin from Hunters Bog Trotters.  There was strong running throughout this race from Will Hensman (57^th; 34.53), Charles Graham-Marr (105^th; 37.52), David Eckersley (106^th; 37.56), Colin Alexander (114^th; 38.19), Iain Dunsmore (138^th; 39.35) and Allan Gall (183^rd; 48.07) with Scott Brember, Charles Graham-Marr and David Eckersley taking Team Masters Bronze medals.

Central’s Ladies title chase looked strong with Morag MacLarty taking the individual Gold with a strong performance pulling away during the first of two laps to complete the 6.6 kilometre course with a time of 22min 50secs, whilst Fanni Gyurko had to fight to gain the bronze medal position with her 23.20 effort. Jenny Wetton followed In quickly afterwards with a fine fifth place in 23.40. With four counters required for the team championship, it was new club member Kim Timmins who had the conclusive impact with a fine run, moving steadily through the field to take 29^th in 26.23 and clinch the title.

The Under 17 Ladies race, over a 4.9 kilometre course, saw Kate Gallagher mixing it with the lead group to finish sixth in 17:43, whilst Lauren McCulloch worked her way up the places after a steady start to take ninth in 18:29.

Kate Gallagher & Lauren McCulloch

As with the Senior Ladies, the overall team title was down to the strong work by Heather Scott as she completed the team counters in 25^th with 21:20.  The Under 17 Men saw Sandy Holl running competitively throughout to finish tenth, covering the 6.6 kilometre course in 22.42.  Keir Howlieson used this race to test his fitness following an injury lay-off, finishing 17^th with 23.16while Tom Graham-Marr finished in an excellent 23.42 in 21^st with the Team in fifth overall. Under 20 Men Iain Davies ((15^th; 29.01) and Fraser MacPherson (26^th; 32.59) completed their 8.4 kilometre challenge with further dogged performances.

The Under 15 Girls title race, over 4kilometres, was very tight with the Central Girls taking Bronze team medals in a close contest with Edinburgh and Pitreavie with only three points separating the three teams.  Kyra Gibb (sixth, 15:26), Rosie Eckersley (ninth, 15:41) and Carrie Banks (16^th, 16:09) put in fine displays to ensure the medals were taken by Central.  The Under 15 Boys were led home through a strong run from Ben MacMillan (sixth; 13.47) with more determined running from Thomas Woods (28^th; 15.05) and Daniel Bruce (35^th; 15.38) with the Boys finishing as fifth team.

The Under 13’s faced a 3.1kilometre challenge and Jessica Turnbull (eleventh; 12:04) and Amy Cully (27^th; 12:59) ran with commitment throughout.  The Under 13 Boys saw Cameron Kerr finish eleventh with 11.11 and Euan Campbell also sticking well to the task for 26^th in 11.54.