II-V Varsity Match 2005
Saturday: We battled Oxford through the woody, muddy tangle of Shotover Country Park. The mens' 2nds to 5ths teams, the ladies 2nds and 3rds, were pitted against Oxford on the hilliest course most of us had ever seen. It was not just the number or the size of the hills, frightening in their own right, but the treacherous twists and turns, the ridiculously low-hanging branch and the majestic views over Oxford which made this course what it was.
First off were the women, the Cheetahs, the Gazelles, and their dark blue rivals. Emma Figures ran hard out from the start, smiling all the way, weaving her way through the Oxford pack, to come in first Cambridge runner home. Emma only started running last year, and this performance is a fitting reflection of the grit and indefatigable good humour with which she has faced the past months of hard training. Talented fresher Hannah Brice slotted in just seconds behind Figures, with Helen Mort and Beth Tanner making up the foursome of scoring Cheetahs. However, the experience of the Oxford ladies showed itself on the hills, and they ran in to a clear victory, claiming the top 9 positions, and both the 2nds and 3rds races.
The 2nds men team -called the Spartans- started strong, with the entire Cambridge team ahead of their Oxford counterparts, the Tortoises. However, as the race progressed, Oxford's top two runners drew ahead over the hills. Matt Sims ran a strong, determined race to come in third, a dramatic climax to his meteoric improvement over the last few months. Oxford took fourth, and Cambridge took fifth to ninth place. Lee Harper, who, only that morning, thought that he would be running for the third team, sprinted past the 5th Oxford scorer to help Cambridge to a close victory in the 2nds match: the first victory in this race since 2001.
The thirds race saw some very gutsy running by Rich Mathie and Matt Grant of the Barbarians. Grant took a wrong right at the start, but he and Mathie still held the lead throughout the entire first lap. However, they took three Oxford runners along for the ride, who wore Grant down to take the first three spots. In spite of some impressive packing by Mark Aldred, Jamie Stewart, captain Si Rutherford and Lance Rane, to put our remaining scorers well ahead of Oxford's, we couldn't quite make up for those three first places. Pete Leek, recently moved up to the third team, ran a hard, intelligent race to pass three Oxford runners on the 2nd lap and just beat Oxford's sixth scorer to the line. However, even this was not quite enough to tip the delicate balance of scores in our favour, and in this, the race which Cambridge felt most confident of winning, Oxford were victorious.
As the gun went off for the 4ths and 5ths race, the ground was blackened by a seething mass of runners. Cambridge supporters dashed to the hills to make their yells of encouragement heard. As the runners finished the first lap, however, it became clear that Oxford had the upper hand. One lap later, we saw David Woods come in with an impressive lead for Oxford. Alex Gastraa stormed into 2nd place with a determined 400m sprint finish. Definitely a man to watch for the coming season. He was followed by a buzzing, dark blue swarm, and two of our seasoned campaigners, Tom Offord and Phil Scard, Both have been recovering from injury, and are fighting their way back up the ranks. The 4ths team was a close race, but Oxford drew ahead with some impressive packing, pushing our final scorers back. In the fifth race, we could not quite match the hordes that we'd mustered on home ground last year, and Oxford were again victorious.
The final score was 5:1 to Oxford. However, this does not reflect the courage and the determination, the hours of training or our captain's sleepless nights of passionate, interminable emailling. The whole club put themselves on the line last Saturday, and didn't give an inch in the face of the most intimidating course we'd ever been up against. The following Saturday we met Oxford again in the 115th Blues Match, on Wimbledon Common.
Aidan Brown