Back to Upjohn Park we went last Saturday. Apparently, I have it on good authority that the Headmaster used to play cricket there as a young whippersnapper last century\u2026 Well, there was no sign of a red ball on the short green stuff on the field last week as the GPS and CAS Cross Country fraternity took it over once again. It is a bit annoying that we continue to lose venues for Cross Country around the city and are forced to double, even triple up venues over the course of the season. Variety still is the spice of life! That being said, Upjohn is a very nice sanctuary for a Saturday morning that does afford a good Cross Country test! We were understrength in a few age groups as injury is already curtailing our desire to be mixing it at the pointy end of the competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our Juniors, though, were not short in number with 16 young blokes competing in their race to kick off proceedings. Henry Grieve<\/strong> had a fine race and cleared out quickly from his teammate and buddy George Harvey<\/strong> from the start. Not that George didn\u2019t try to catch him up! Yet, Henry hung on tenaciously to snavel his second Top Ten of the season in 7th (6th GPS). George wasn\u2019t far adrift 13th (9th). Those two even squeezed a little more training in together at the end of last week\u2019s training session, keen as! Zac Roberston<\/strong> ran superbly despite suffering from the lurgy in the lead up to Saturday. Though he sent a warning shot across the bow of his competitors, as he still managed to finish 20th (13th) when unwell! We look forward to him firing at 100 percent! Jackson Harris<\/strong> managed to get back with us and immediately settled into battle with teammate Alex Baxter<\/strong>. These two pushed each other for the duration, with Jackson prevailing, narrowly, at race end. Jackson finished 33rd (20th) to be one GPS spot ahead of Alex in 36th (21st). Nice! Jackson completed our Junior Team on the day as they were 3rd amongst the GPS Schools. Big shout out to Harry Loveridge,<\/strong> who joined us for the first time, and it was great to have Harrison Thomas<\/strong> back with us as he juggles multiple winter sporting commitments. Harry finished 62nd (39th), and Harrison was 63rd (40th). It was also great to see Leon Field<\/strong> heading toward some of the form he ended the season in last year, we trust the positive momentum will continue!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our Intermediates were decimated by injury, both prior to, and during, the race. We were missing Jonty Jagger<\/strong> and Ben Frantz<\/strong> prior to the race, and Hugo Stewart<\/strong> pulled up lame, well, not quite, but was nowhere near his best in his on-course effort. James Warren<\/strong> put his hand up, yet again, as possibly the first Shore boy to back up for a second Season as the anointed \u2018Machine\u2019 of the Shore Cross Country programme. He was once again at his tenacious best as he led the Intermediates on course, finishing just outside the Top Ten in 11th, yet was 5th amongst the GPS athletes. He never takes a backward step or is at all daunted by the more fancied and seasoned athletes! Digby Wood <\/strong>toughed it out to finish 49th (32nd) with Hugo Pope<\/strong> not far adrift in 52nd (35th). His best is still ahead of him, and we do hope training soon starts paying dividends in his racing. Edward Dunnett<\/strong> completed our Intermediate team as he was 67th (44th). The Intermediates finished 5th amongst the GPS teams on the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We were thin on the ground in the Opens with only four Opens runners starting the race. They were excited to see Toby Ward<\/strong> join them after his football game, though he wasn\u2019t at his best after his exertion on the pitch\u2026 James Bestic<\/strong> ran with better tactics than last week, still going out hard but not at the same crazy level as the week before, and he managed to finish a strong 15th overall to be 11th amongst the GPS lads. He knows his targets and no doubt will be closing on them as the season unfolds! Thomas Gray<\/strong> was better too, yet we feel he should try to stay with James early on as he has the potential to do so, certainly his road running form points toward it! He finished a solid 23rd (16th). Fraser Pandit<\/strong> slid ahead of Daniel Becker<\/strong> on the weekend, and his form is progressing nicely as they completed our Open Team result of 7th as they were 61st (45th) and 66th (50th) respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Shore Cross Country \u2018Machine of the Week\u2019:<\/strong> The coaches unanimously chose Henry Grieve<\/strong> following last week’s racing as our \u2018Machine of the Week\u2019! Nice!<\/p>\n\n\n\n We are off to St Ignatius\u2019 College, Riverview tomorrow. It is currently slated as being the same course as last year, so look forward to a \u2018mudbath\u2019! Stock up on the \u2018Napisan\u2019 peeps!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Good running,<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr Michael Spratt<\/strong> Saturday 17 May 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":25954,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","article_category":[24],"article_tag":[],"class_list":["post-25938","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","article_category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/25938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/article"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"article_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_category?post=25938"},{"taxonomy":"article_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/shore-weekly-record\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_tag?post=25938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
MIC Cross Country<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/d1dfwahqlx324v.cloudfront.net\/uploads\/sites\/57\/2025\/05\/IMG_4266.jpg\")
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