Freshers' Fun Run 2008
By James Chettle
On a cloudless autumn day over West Cambridge, the new season got underway with the 2008 Freshers' Fun Run. Several talented freshers displayed their potential while many old hands posted significant improvements on their times from last year. If these performances are anything to go by, the Varsity Matches may be swinging towards a lighter shade of blue.
In the women's race, Roach (Trinity) opened up an imposing lead early on and finished a remarkable 54 seconds clear of her nearest rival Anderson, the Girtonian held off a strong challenge from a pack of three behind her to claim second place. From this group, Keen (Murray Edwards) emerged to take third, expressing her relief after the race at not losing to (in her own words) the octogenarian club president. An impressive debut from Richards (Robinson) saw her scoop the award as top fresher. Despite two Trinity runners in the top four, Selwyn denied them victory in the team event by the closest possible margin: with the two colleges tying on 202 points, Selwyn took the win by having the higher placed final scorer.
In the men's race, with club captain Kelly (Jesus) boxed in for the entire race, Pattison took full advantage to lead home a Downing 1-2 ahead of Bannon, the top fresher. The stage finally looked set for a toppling of Jesus, but with a large contingent out, the reigning champions narrowly edged out Downing for top spot. This was in no small part due to a solid third place finish from Brown, negating Kelly's (hopefully temporary) loss of mobility. Drama was to follow after the race as a frantic search took place for the phantom eighth placed runner, who had employed many years' worth of military stealth training to evade our timekeepers at the finish.
As the day came to a close, the Hare & Hounds came away from Wilberforce Road confident in the knowledge that new blood had replaced the old, and that the club was well set for the season ahead.
A big thanks goes to everyone who made the event such a success, in particular to our League Organisers Jane Mackey and Alex Bell and to our Social Secretaries Matt Grant and Simon Gilbert for refuelling us after the race, Tim Johnston for helping with the scoring, along with another girl who volunteered at the last minute (please let us know your name), our marshalls Matt Grant, Matt Armstrong, Jon Cook and David Nefs. Thanks too to Mark Coley for collating the results (in record time) and getting them uploaded to the website whilst people were still in the pavilion eating cake.