18 October 2025 – Somerhill, Tonbridge
Main Reports by Ashley Pearson; additional report by Micah Evans
Saturday saw the squad off to Somerhill, for round 2 of the Kent XC league. With numbers a little down on the previous week due to the start of half term and some early Halloween parties! we still managed to turn out almost 100 members.
The weather was kind to us, being dry, cool and not too breezy. Our tent crew of Paul A and Dave C were able to claim their favoured spot ensuring good views of the start and finish without being encroached by other clubs!
We had a great turn out of parents to support our runners and Stella’s mum Katie treated us all to some lovely chocolate Crispies. Excellent post-Somerhill recovery snacks.
It was a slightly earlier start than usual to the racing with the U11 race that Tonbridge very generously put on. We saw a super sprint finish in the girls race with Inara Homans-Yau just edging out Blake Amos for 2nd and 3rd. Then it was over to Quentin Aldridge, flying the family flag to take 8th in the boys race. Great to see the next wave of recruits coming through!
Moving on to the U13 girls and we couldn’t have asked for a better start. Lucy Junginger in her first Kent league flew round to victory with Jazzy Stephens backing up her 2nd from last week with another solid 2nd. Olivia King ran a huge improvement on last week to take 8th and complete the winning team. Just behind we had a wave of Blackheathens with Lucy B in 10th, Lena A in 11th, Arianne in 12th, Mollie 13th, Zara 15th and Alice B in 20th. A solid team win over Tonbridge and a great start to the day.
Over to the U13 boys and it was very much a case “anything you can do, we can do too”. The 1-2 came from last week’s winner Emery Aldridge and last week’s 3rd Zachary Evans. Akul was also up on last week to take 7th and give the boys a resounding team win (10points) over CPA (33points) and Tonbridge (40points). George DB, Anthony and Luc worked well together to take 9, 10 and 11th. Harry did well to finish despite not feeling himself and Haydn overcame a fall to maintain the same position as last week. Fletcher improved by almost 20 positions from last week along with Freddie and Ethan both improving on last week.
Moving up to the U15s and the girls maintained the team winning streak with 4th, 5th and 6th from last weeks winning trio, but in a slightly different order. Harriet H, Evie DB and Alba HY. The girls were well clear of Tonbridge in 2nd and Dartford in 3rd. Also having strong runs we had Sofia M in 7th and Ella in 11th with Stella 18th – a big jump on last week. Eva J, Isabella J and Chloe M all ran well together to make the top 30 along with Aoife S, Elliott A, Imogen and Clemence all tackling the Somerhill hills with real determination.
It was team bronze for the boys just a couple of points behind Ashford, but it had been a strong day out for Tonbridge. Just 12 boys running this week, down on last week’s 21 but all putting in some strong performances. The scoring team of Johnny, Jack and Alex S all finishing in the top 20, with Benj, Billy and Dexter all in the top 30 and well up on last week’s positions. Juan was running for the first time this year along with Zach P placing 32nd and 33rd, and it was big improvements for Matthew, Jesse, Akin and Lewis.
It was team fourth for our U17W. The scoring team of Jasmin M, Rowan and Aida all impressed with higher positions than last week and showed great pace judgement over the longer 5km course. Backed up by Niamh S and Caitlin H, who both ran strongly over the very hilly, challenging terrain. Kyla had another strong run to finish 4th again in the U20 women’s race. And it was great to see Libby racing strongly to take 7th.
Our final age group race was the U17/20 men and they really put on a show. They dominated the U17 team race with an overall 1-2 from the Joes; Scanes and Hill, with Alex M completing the scoring team with a fantastic 6th. Aniket, Nathan and Daniel, weren’t far back in 8th, 9th and 11th. James Shaw showing great resilience after being unwell most of the week in 15th, edging out a fast finishing Kian in 16th with Madalitso just behind in 20th. A super performance from the 17s. With Mark C out injured from last week’s race, it was left to Jed to fly the flag for the U20s this week who ran a solid race to place 2nd.
Finally it was the turn of the seniors. Tonbridge had clearly played their ‘home race’ card. By placing 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th at the front of the women’s race along with 1st to 7th in the men’s race!! It was still however a very strong day for our ladies and Chloe and Hannah did well to disrupt the Tonbridge party taking 2nd and 3rd behind Phoebe Baker. Jennie B was our 3rd to score in 15th, taking 2nd W45 and more importantly 1st in our Mum’s race. Gracie had another solid run in 23rd and our new mums Angie and Liz did well to just take on the challenging Tonbridge course. Thankfully ignoring daughter Alice’s advice!!
It was another top 10 finish for Sam Parsons in 8th and great to see Mark Ellison making his kent league debut this year. In the Dad’s race, Micah turned the tables on Leon from last weekend finishing 20th and 27th and both finishing 5th and 6th in their masters age classification. Sam Aldridge came in for 3rd this week, pushing Philip B down into 4th. With Barry H and Chris M just behind in 5th and 6th.
Supplemental report on SM from Micah Evans
Like last time out, after some excellent races and results from the Club’s juniors earlier on, as well as a strong individual and team performance from our ladies, it was the turn of our senior men’s team.
Although the weather wasn’t as warm and sunny as the previous week, it was still excellent race conditions, with firm and dry ground giving some help to us runners given we certainly weren’t going to get any from the (in)famous hills.
First home for us was Sam Parsons with his second successive Top 10 placing, this week going one better in 8th place with a super run and breaking up the Tonbridge home dominance up front in a race won comfortably by former National Cross Champion James Kingston.
Micah Evans was 2nd scorer in 20th place in a much-improved showing on the previous week, perhaps getting back towards his best and helped by the hills though not the lack of mud.
3rd man home in 27th place was Leon De Bruyn with another excellent run, edging out Justin Strover who completed our 4 to score in 29th. Justin started fast on his return to XC racing for the club being boosted by fond memories of his junior age group days racing at Somerhill and great support crew in full voice!
Two places back in 31st and with a great run was Dave Adams (this time unencumbered by having to race a 10k on the Sunday!) and just two places behind Dave was Graeme Lugar in 33rd with a very welcome return in his first race as a new Dad (Congrats Mr and Mrs Lugar!).
Will Reedman-White with a second consecutive Top 50 finish was 44th, Sam Aldridge, Kent Masters 1500m Champion making his season XC debut (his son having won the U13s earlier!) was 50th and Martin Richardson with his second race in two weeks was very consistent – again with full family support and again in 55th place a la Foots Cray.
Then came Doug Varney fresh (or not?!) from running 18:40 at Avery Hill Parkrun in 64th and consistent runs from Gareth Evans in 81st and Paul Sharpe in 84th. Greg Firth was over 20 places higher than last week in 92nd, Phil Bunn 94th beating his last week’s placement by one and Jon Pairman sneaking into the Top 100 in 99th, 37 places higher than last week – great improvement!
James Webber, designated driver and Aussie Rules lookalike was in 113rd in his first XC appearance of the season, Darren Corneille with a top sprint finish was in 138th, Barry Horgan in 165th, Chris Martin in 188th, James Breen Norris in 202nd and Mark Ellison (M60) with a great effort in 218th completed our runners and riders.
So for the second week running we had 20+ men racing and hopefully with numbers to be boosted by returning teammates for the final two KLXC races at Danson Park (15th Nov) and Norman Park (13th Dec).
This time round we placed 3rd in the 4 to score behind Tonbridge and Cambridge Harriers and are also 3rd at half way in the overall standings.
We finished a very strong 2nd in the 12 to score behind Tonbridge and are 3rd overall, just behind Cambridge after two races, so all to play for and every man counts in the final two races – hope to see as many of you as possible there
Full results are on the Kent Athletics website here
