Another successful venture on Saturday for the Striders at the Essex Vets at Chigwell Row on a mild December day.

First off were the women and the V50 men. The womens’ medal chances had been hit by a couple of late withdrawals. Despite this superb performances from Sarah Colbert 12th, Vic Curren 21st and Nikki Pyle 22nd led the 8 strong women’s team to a well deserved bronze medal. In addition Nikki secured a fine silver medal in the V45 category. Lynn Tanner was only a few seconds behind Vic and Nikki but had a great consolation in winning the V55 title and remains unbeaten in this category this year. There were also fine runs by Catherine Hull 32nd, Helen Bateman 49th, Kirsty Williams 61st and Jakki Mudd in 71st with the women's B Team coming in a creditable 9th.

In the V55 men, Paul Jeggo kept up his high consistency this season with a strong run in 8th place. Next in for the men was Tim Brockington in 42nd. Richard Taylor followed soon behind in 45th and Paul Stukas in his V50 debut in 48th. Rob Rodie had a good run in 68th and Malcolm Savage was 94th, The Vet 50 team finished in 9th place.

In the V40 category, Paul Dobson turned back the years and meant business from the off. It was only at the end that he was run out of a medal but still finished in a commendable 4th. Debutant Lee Martin and one of the youngest if not the youngest in the race, started off his life in the Vets with a strong 11th. Not far behind him was Gary Chandler and Kev Harris battling it out for 14th and 15th places. The strong quartet did more than enough to take an excellent team gold with 44 points, holding off host club Ilford who had 49. Backing them up admirably was Darren Sutton who did his job by beating Ilford's 4th runner in finishing 23. Darren was supported in the B team by Mark Waine in 26th, Ian Cardy in 30th and Andy Mason in 48th to finish 6th in the team event. Not far behind Andy was Gary Joslin in 50th, with Julian Catmull 63rd and Darren Hull 83rd also having good runs.

The winning V40 Mens team, l to r - Paul Dobson, Lee Martin, Kev Harris & Gary Chandler