Cross Country Reports – October 2023

With news of last Thursday’s Suffolk Schools Cross Country Trial and this week’s English Schools Cross Country Cup, you can read about the athletes and their exceptional performances in our report.

Suffolk Schools Cross Country Trial
On Thursday 11 October 52 Woodbridge School athletes, from both the Senior School and the Prep, travelled to RHS for the first Suffolk Schools Cross Country trial., and it proved to be another day to be extremely proud of our young athletes.

Their performances were exceptional and full results (of the top 50 in each category) can be seen at www.suffolkschoolsathletics.info.
Results are on the cross country tab.

In terms of a highlight summary, here is the Woodbridge School dashboard:
With up to 200 athletes in some races, 40 of our athletes qualified for the final trial in January (hosted by Woodbridge School) by finishing in the top 50 in their race. Although largely an individual event, we had some spectacular team results with three wins and a third from over 35 schools in our races. Our athletes won medals for individual top three places in 6 of the 8 races, winning 9 of the 24 medals overall:

Gold Medal Winners:
Year 7’s India (Minors Year 6 & 7)
Year 7’s Josh (Minors Year 6 & 7)
Year 13’s Henry (Seniors Year 12 & 13)

Silver Medal Winners:
Year 7’s Ella (Minors Year 6 & 7)
Year 7’s Dex (Minors Year 6 & 7)
Year 9s Romilly (Juniors Year 8 & 9)
Year 8’s Digby (Juniors Year 8 & 9)
Year 11’s Angus (Inters Year 10 & 11)

Bronze Medal Winner:
Year 7’s Alexandra (Minors Year 6 & 7)

Races of note were:

• The Minor Girls, where Woodbridge School had an unprecedented 1-2-3-4 across the line and 8 in the top 21.
• Not to be outdone Minor Boys had 6 in the top 10 and 8 in 22.
• Junior Girls had 4 in the top 10 and 6 in 21.

Remember this is from up to 200 athletes in a race!

Ahead of the final trial in January, Woodbridge School still has over 20 athletes in contention for County selection and around seven fighting for the right to compete at English Schools in Pontefract in March.

Congratulations to every athlete and a huge thank you to staff and parents for their support on the day.

English Schools Cross Country Cup
On Tuesday 17 October, all five of our age group cross country teams that entered the English Schools Cross Country Cup competed in the County Round at Farlingaye. With the top three teams in each race progressing to Regionals, we are excited to report that all five teams qualified with four wins and a second.

We had individual winners in three of those races with Year 8’s Digby winning Junior Boys, Year 9’s Romilly winning Inter Girls and year 13’s Henry winning Senior Boys .

This time it was the turn of the Junior Boys to shine, with our team of four scorers crossing the line with a 1-2-3-4, matching the Minor Girls achievement at Suffolk Schools last week.

Congratulations to every athlete and good luck to our teams racing Regionals at Southend High School for Boys in Essex on Saturday 11 November.

Added excitement this year of course, as Woodbridge School are to host the 42nd English Schools Cross Country Cup Final on Saturday 02 December!