14 Not Out for Scottish Lions
The young stars of Scotland extended their winning record in the Junior Inter-Regional Championships to 14 years as they carved out an eventual win over Yorkshire & Humberside over two days in the Lake District.
It's now so long since Scotland was victorious that the youngest team members weren't even born the last time the saltire wasn't on the overall trophy, and as well as a coaching team led by FVO's Roger Goddard for the first time, there were eight local athletes on the Scotland team.
The Individual day got off to the best of starts, as Lucas Baikie won on the M14 course in 30.59, and James Edward was 3rd (37.15) to pick up major points for the team total. Matthew Owen was also in action, but his 16th place (45.59) wasn't needed on the day.
Double Inman across the classes, where Hannah was 4th home in W14 (42.41) as the best-placed Scot, and Matthew was 6th in M16 (41.30) and also appeared on the team scoreboard. Fraser Cheyne was 11th (47.35) in M16.
Esme Kelly was 7th in W16, where YHOA blocked out the top three positions (46.47) getting into the scores, and Peter Owen was 9th in M18 (56.31), but this wasn't required for the team score as Scotland took 1st and 3rd places.
The Scots carried a narrow four point lead over Yorkshire into the relays, and even with early scoreboard pressure, held their nerve to retain both the relay trophy and the overall honours.
The girls race was the first action of the day, where Yorkshire featured the top three W16s from the Individal race on the opening leg, and brought their teams back for the first changeover in the driving seat and filling the podium. Scotland was deprived of the services of one team due to an injury on day 1, so it was important there were no on-field mistakes. Lucy Ward was 5th (28.53) as the best placed Scot on the leg, with Esme Kelly 27 seconds further behind in 6th.
Hannah Inman struck first on the middle leg, as she posted the quickest time (22.17) to bring Scotland back onto the podium again, 26 seconds off the front. As race leaders North West then went out on a mispunch, it became a straight race between Freya Tryner for Yorkshire and Emily Atkinson for Scotland for 1st, and Freya was quick round to take the win, but Emily, despite dropping five minutes on the leg, got home safely for 2nd.
The crucial action was further down the leaderboard, in the race for second teams, and Ruth Gooch brought Scotland B home in 3rd, even with the Yorkshire B closer posting the quickest time for the leg. The points from the women's relay were shared, maintaining Scotland's four point gap, and it was up to the men to bring home the bacon, which they did with aplomb.
The Scots were in all kinds of bother after the opening men's leg, as they lay 7th and 8th at that stage, compared with 2nd and 4th for Yorkshire. Matthew Inman had the 7th place in 26.30, while Fraser Cheyne was 13th (29.59) for Scotland D.
Bother? What bother? Enter Lucas Baikie on leg 2, and exit the quickest time for the leg, a cheeky 19.02 to bring Scotland back onto the front of the race. James Edward was also in fine fettle, as his 22.37 lifted Scotland A into 4th, three seconds behind the best Yorkshire team, while Matthew Owen also had a part to play, bringing Scotland C up into 10th with the 5th fastest time for the leg (22.25).
There were different gaffles for the Scottish leaders, but the same result in the end, as ECKO's Ruari Cottier held off a strong run from TAY's Finn Selmer Duguid, who gained more than three minutes on the leg for a Scotland 1-2, maximum points, and the Relay title staying in blue hands.
Peter Owen was on closers for Scotland D, and was 15th (36.37). Spare a thought too for Northern Ireland, who finished the day with zero points, having not managed to get out a girls team, and saw both their boys teams mispunch.