Press Report 17th December 2019  

Dec 172019
 

ESSEX CROSS-COUNTRY LEAGUE
Writtle College
Saturday 14 December

 

Jak Wright Storms home to win U17 Essex League title

 

Ilford youngsters were out in force on Saturday in the third Essex league cross country league race.
Best performance of the day came from Jak Wright,who ran his best race of the season so far in the U17s race.
Wright is keen to win the overall Essex cross country title this season ,which is given to the athlete who performs the best over 4 of the 5 races.
Jack knew he had to run well and run well he did.
He sat with the 3 leaders most of the race, until the last mile , when he picked the pace up and went away from the field. He increased his lead over the final part of the race to win his first cross country league race

Bradley Deacon was one of the 4 athletes that went away from the field and stayed with the 3 leaders for a large part of the race. Brad was catching the third position at the end but just ran out of time, finishing in 4th place.
However this was also one of Brads best races and best position ever and once again proves how good Bradley is becoming as an athlete

In the U13s race,Ilford had 3 athletes competing
Joseph Grange,Jak Wrights younger brother, once again proved his ability and fitness to come a magnificent 5th
Joseph got off to a good start and went with the leaders and held third for a while but just got caught by 2 athletes a before the end of the race
Aaron Hick and Lucas Emeagi came a very respectable 30th and 36th position

In the U15s the 3 Ilford athletes Jacob Emeagi ,Oliver Blaine and Vitor Marten pushed each other to come 34th,35th and 40th
Special mention to Oliver as this was his first ever cross country race for Ilford

In the U20s Women’s race Jordan hinds battled her way to a very creditable 15th position 

  Press Report 9th December 2019  

Dec 092019
 

South of England inter-counties Cross Country Champs
Horspath, Oxford
Saturday 7th December

Aaron Samuel and Jak Wright of Ilford AC travelled up to Horspath on Saturday 7th December to compete in the South of England Inter-counties Championships. Both athletes battled through a tough course, plagued with mud and hills. Aaron and Jak positioned 2nd and 33rd respectively after being selected to represent Essex for coming top 8 in one of the league races. 

Aaron stuck with the front pack from the start, where not far into the race a group of 4 athletes, including himself broke away. It was a tough battle with fast uphills and even faster downhills. About halfway through the race, Aaron and a Middlesex athlete broke away from the other two athletes and were battling it out for about a kilometre and a half. But from 1 kilometre to go first place also started to break away from Aaron the Ilford athlete did his best to maintain his position for the rest of the race and managed to secure an impressive second individual place.

Jak delivered another solid performance this season, coming home as the 4th Essex scorer. After a conservative start, Jak gained plenty of places during the hilly and muddy sections of the course. Showcasing his strength, he managed to pick up a multitude of positions during the last kilometre of the course. Jak was pleased with his position, with this being the first time he has represented the county for cross country. 

Overall, the Essex team scored 5th out of the 11 counties in the South of England that competed. Both Ilford AC athletes had been training extremely hard for this race and are looking to extend their success to the remainder of the season.

Telford 10k
Sunday 8th December

The Telford 10k is one of the seasons most competitive, attracting elite club runners from all over the country. The best of these go off in the first wave of the day, and is for runners expected to finish in under 40 minutes. One of these elite runners was Ilfords own Ahmed Abdulle who despite the bleak wet and windy conditions on the day managed to smash his 10k Pb finishing 43rd in a field of over 1200 runners in a time of 30 minutes 32 seconds, securing him 7th place in the U23 category.

The race was won by Adam Craig of Inverclyde in 28 minutes 32 seconds

 

  Press Report 3rd December 2019  

Dec 022019
 

Essex County U13 / U15 / Veterans’ Championships
Writtle College
Saturday 30 November

Grange storms to 4th in Essex Champs

The U13s and U15s Essex X Country champs was held at a cold , wet and windy  Writtle university on Saturday. For the first time for many years Ilford was in a position to enter a team in the Both Boys events.

Three of the U13s Ilford team were making their debut in the Essex X Country champs . The 4th youngster  was Joseph Grange, who the previous weekend had run so well in the London Youth Games. In a high quality field, Joseph  was in the top 10 for the start of the race and worked his way through the field to come an outstanding 4th position , nearly catching the Bronze medallist in the final sprint.

James Thake, 25th, Aaron Hick, 27th and Lucas Emeagi 30th, all chased each other and passed many athletes over the last  half a mile, to all have outstanding runs. The young team came an impressive 4th position and all 4 can only get better over the next few years

 

 

In the U15s Ryan Holeyman ran very well to come in for 16th position ,Matthew Hick came 35th and Jacob Emeagi came 41st

  Press Report 26th November 2019  

Nov 262019
 

London University Championships

Having recently completed her A levels, Jordan Hinds is now attending Queen Mary University, the university has active athletic team and she has recently competed twice in the London Universities Cross Country League.

However this weekend she took a break from the mud to compete indoors in the London Universities championships. There was a big field  for an indoor race for the ladies 800m championship and in only her second race ever indoors Jordan took the Bronze medal in an indoor pb time of 2.33.69.

 

British Cross Challenge including the European Trials

Ilfords Ahmed Abdulle competed at these trials held at Sefton Park Liverpool.
Ahmed found the going hard on this muddy and demanding course and had to settle for 70th place in 33:45 some 3 minutes behind the winner Ben Connor of Derby but placed 27th in the u/23 category

  Press Report November 18th 2019  

Nov 182019
 

Samuels Wins the London Youth Games

A number of Ilford Athletic club athletes represented their London Boroughs on Saturday at a very wet Parliament Hill

First up was newly joined u11 athlete Ryder Islam. Ryder started well in the 1.5 k race and used his strength to work through the field to come a very encouraging 57th .

In the u13s Joseph Grange ran an outstanding race.Training with the main group at Ilford has helped build Joseph’s speed and endurance and this was shown in his performance. He worked through the field and had so much left at the end of the race to come a superb 10th position.

In the same race Aaron Hick , struggled at the start of the race but battled along to come 115th.

In the u15s Ryan Holeyman ,coming back from a  slight injury, performed to a high standard as usual. He ran very well against a quality field to come 43rd

In the u17s race Ilford had 3 quality athletes compete for 3 separate boroughs.Aaron samuels,Jak Wright and Bradley Deacon all got good starts and were all in the top 15 for the first half mile.There was a breakaway of about 3 or 4 athletes, which included Aaron – Jak and Bradley were in the second pack.
Aaron seemed to be going very well, sitting on the shoulder of the leader, Oliver Bright.

Being roared on by his Ilford athlete colleagues, Aaron made the decisive kick about 600 metres to go. The last part of the course is completely down hill and Aaron seemed to be flying down the hill and took nearly 10 seconds out of Bright in the last 600. Aaron ran the 4.5 k in 16:47 and became London Youth Games champion for 2019.
This is a very prestigious title and proves that Aaron is running the best he has ever ran at the moment

There was not much between Jak and Bradly over the last 2 miles of the race and both stayed in the pack. Both ran extremely well to finish 21st and 25th.
Once again this was a high quality race and both Jak and Brad showed how much they have come on over the last few years

 

Mungo Prior ran in the Senior Mens London race for the first time. Mungo , still only 17 came a very competitive 55th