Matthew Stone heads large Striders contingent at mobmatch

Striders of Croydon produced some good performances in the fourth annual Helen Furze Memorial Mobmatch, held in conjunction with the weekly parkrun at Nonsuch Park on Saturday morning. They had 38 of the 579 finishers, led by Matthew Stone who ran very well to place tenth overall and first in the over-50 category, covering the five-kilometre course in 19 minutes 02 seconds. Striders’ first four finishers were all aged over 50, with Steve Massey placing 22nd (19.57), Paul Cripps 40th (20.35) and Chris Morton 41st (20.35). Peter Laurence was 43rd (20.43), Darren Woods 47th (20.54) and Christopher Finch 71st (21.56). Striders had the first two finishers in the over-65 category with Barry Finch placing 157th overall (24.24) and Colin Cotton 194th (25.20). Striders’ women were led by Steph Upton who was the 14th woman to finish, recording 22 minutes 55. Nikki Javan was close behind her in 15th (22.59) while Lucy Finch was 17th (23.34), Alice Ewen 19th (23.59), Adele Boesinger 20th (24.13), Lucy Kulp 23rd (24.26) and Selena Wong 31st (25.03).

On Saturday afternoon, Striders finished eleventh in the Brent Shield inter-club cross-country race at Beckenham. They were led by Luke Burden who placed 92nd, covering the five-mile course in 34 minutes 25. Team manager Krzysztof Klidzia was 108th (35.04) with Stephen Harris 134th (35.49), Mick Turner 135th (35.55), Joseph Ibe 149th (36.45), Micky Wheeler 150th (36.52), Mark Kelly 188th (38.46) and Steve Barker 251st (46.13). In the women’s race, Karen Speed placed 66th in 47 minutes 34.