Fraternity & Sorority Cups (December 2018)

Trent Park
Saturday November 24th and organised by Barnet & District AC

ALEX LEPRETRE had the previous Saturday come third in the London Championships, at his first attempt and, had improved his personal best for 5k on the track 15:28.39 in 2017 to 14:34.41 this year Alastair Aitken reports.

In the event that started 85 years ago 350 runners completed, due to the fact the event being combined with the Chingford league.
After the smaller of the three laps at Trent Park, the leader was Ethiopian Seyfu Jamaal with Lepetre twenty metres behind, followed by Tom Aldridge. Le Petre said “The first mile was in about 5:06 and it was then, at the back of the course in the second lap I decided to put the hammer down and see what happened. At the end of the second lap he was well clear of the next man Jamaal and never looked like losing after that. He put his improvement down to training with the fast Highgate Harriers at Parliament Hill on the Tuesday under Coach Ben Pochee and on Hampstead Heath on the Saturday under Ben’s half brother Brahma Pochee, when he was not racing.

It was interesting to see Doug Milsom, the oldest in the race, who will be 80 in May next year.
He runs with a pacemaker in. He said that for a ‘Single age group year of 79’ he topped the lists from 800 upwards.
London Heathside followed up their women’s victory in the London cross, with their men winning the Fraternity Cup where as Victoria Park, won the Sorority Cup.
Rachel Thomas was the individual winner for the Sorority Cup. At 33 she was fifth in the Met League at Claybury and pointed out “I played hockey from 11 to 28. My club was Hampstead & Westminster who were a good team. After my son was born I decided to just concentrate on running for my club Victoria Park.