Winchester & District Athletics Club dominated the Hampshire Cross Country Championships on Saturday, with an unprecedented seven wins in the eight junior team competitions and six individual titles.

Staged at Fairthorne Manor near Botley, competitors faced high winds as well as drenched course conditions but the black and gold of the Winchester club - proudly worn by more than 100 runners - was comfortably the most successful.

Helen Hall and Rose Chesterfield are the new Hampshire champions in respectively the senior and Under-20 women’s events while Annie Mann, the European Under-18 1,500m champion, won the girls’ Under-17 titles to add to a collection of cross-county golds that started with the Under-11s in 2017.

Will Atkins made it a double in the Under-17 events, producing one of the best performances in any race to win the boys’ title against runners who were largely a year older.

There were also golds in the veteran’s categories from Kath Bailey who won the Over-50s title and Martyn West, the first Over-70s finisher.

Competing with athletes from across mainland Hampshire, as well as Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Wight, Winchester’s tally of 88 competitors aged from 9 to 17 made up almost a third of all junior runners and reflected the huge recent growth of the club.

After winning five of the eight team titles in 2022, that strength in depth was even more evident this year.

In the first race of the day, the Under-11 boys, Eddie Clegg took individual silver to lead training partners Alfie Fox, Timo Thomas Machleidt and Oliver Furby to team gold.

The Under-11 girls were then even more dominant, with Millie Honan also winning individual silver and joined by Aoife Uniacke, Francesca Bertacchini and Millie English in taking team gold. Winchester’s ‘B’ team of Hallie Eldridge, Isabelle Hoskins, Millie Morgan and Matilda Joslin also performed superbly for bronze medals. 

The success continued in the Under-13 boys, with Luke Furby and Iosu Harfield producing strong finishes to combine with Oliver Foden and Samuel Parker for another team gold.

In the same age group, the girls team of Eleanor Jepson, Elodie Gill, Rosanna Fox-Robinson and Amber Price followed that up with an excellent bronze.

The Under-15 boys was another showcase for Winchester’s quality and quantity, with Ruben Price racing to individual bronze and joined by Stanley Phillips, Thomas Jacobs and Sam Wilkinson for team gold and then Seb Murray, Aiden Furby, Seth Noott and Ivor Martin for team bronze. 

Kate Atkinson then narrowly missed out on an individual medal after 4km through the mud in the girls Under-15 race but was joined by Poppy Taylor, Rosie Sharrock and Grace Baker for team gold.

Mann’s individual win in the Under-17 girls was critical to another team triumph supported by Eve Bailey, who took individual silver, and Jasmine Gosse while Atkins led Eddie Chambers and Ben Chesterfield to gold in the boys’ race of the same age category.

There was also considerable success in the senior events. India Lee, a former European triathlon champion, followed Hall home for a Winchester one-two in the women’s senior race and team silver alongside Bailey and Ellie Swire. Bailey also picked up a team gold - her third medal of the day - in the women’s veterans with Jane Gandee, Sam Parkinson and Charlie Hoskins.

The veteran men’s team of Jacques Caignard, Richard Bidgood, Wayne Bevan and David Comb then finished a remarkable day as it had begun with another Winchester triumph.