- Posted November 15, 2018
Cross Internacional de Atapuerca race on Sunday 11th November 2018
Report from Ben West and his first international race for England:-
The IAAF permit races gives various UK runners the chance to experience International competition. The event attracts teams from all over Europe and Africa.
This leg takes place at Atapuerca near Burgos in Northern Spain between Madrid and Bilbao.
The U20 men’s course is 6.5km long and largely flat with several man made obstacles placed at intervals around the track. The field was 213 strong which were a mix of Spanish Top league clubs and international teams. Conditions on the day were firm and dry with a temperature of around 9 degrees.
There were 4 of us in the England U20 men’s team Rory Leonard, Tom Keen, Connor Bentley and myself . My race got off to a poor start when about 1km in my left shoe was pulled off by another competitor's spike; I was forced to stop and put it back on. I lost 40 or 50 places during this because the field was still quite bunched up at this point. Once I got into my stride I was able to pull back some of the loss but with the class of the field there was little real prospect of getting back to the front. I finally finished 24/213 just behind Tom Keen.
The race was won by Jake Hayward (Welsh) with Rory in second spot.
