Hercules Wimbledon's supervets cross country team added to their substantial collection of rewards this season by taking team silver in the South of England veterans cross country championships at Parliament Hill Fields, writes Tom Pollak.

This success adds to their gold medal winning performance in the Surrey cross country championships in Richmond Park and their gold medal-winning effort in the South of England road relay championships at Aldershot.

Hercules' hopes of making it a hat-trick of golds were hindered as two of the gold medal-winning team at Aldershot and Richmond Park, former internationals Grenville Tuck and Steve Badgery, were both unable to race in north London.

But the quartet who did turn out did well to even return with a set of medals.

They were led home by British veteran international Vince Hancock, at 57 the oldest member of the squad, who finished 10th in 37 minutes 44 seconds.

Marco Ciglia was 26th in 40:01, Paul Roche 32nd in 41:25 and Dennis Williams 36th and 11th veteran over 55 in 41:42.

Hercules Wimbledon also had a trio of runners in the over 40s race.

They were led home by Steve Sinnott who was 39th in 37:15, Andy Cunningham 50th in 37:55 and Martin O'Halloran 16th in the over 45 category in 38:51.

It was quite a family affair for the O'Halloran family as Martin's 11-year-old son Michael was also in action at Parliament Hill Fields.

He helped Sutton to the team title in the Heathrow London Youth Games junior boys cross country championship. O'Halloran junior was 12th in his race in 7:34.

Best placed Hercules Wimbledon youngster in the six Heathrow London Youth Games races was Imogen Stodart who just missed out on a medal in the junior girls race.

She was fourth in 8min 19sec, leading Merton to seventh team place.

Another Hercules Wimbledon youngster, Alex Bodin, was the first Merton finisher in the intermediate boys race where he was 13th in 10:38.

December 4, 2001 13:35