The 5th race in the 2025 / 26 Kent Fitness League series took place in Betteshanger Park, Deal on Sunday January 11th, writes Jim Knight. 447 runners, including 25 who had made the long journey from Sevenoaks, raced on the 5-mile course involving two laps of the perimeter of the Country Park. The course is flat and fast, favouring road and track runners although with some technical areas with short steep descents/ascents, narrow paths which caused a few bottlenecks and plenty of tree roots to navigate. It was considerably more muddy than last week’s race and still bitterly cold.
The Sevenoaks team was missing several key members through injury and prior commitments, but the women’s team performed brilliantly again to secure second place behind a strong team from Canterbury Harriers. Sevenoaks’ Andrea Berquez ran exceptionally well to win the women’s race by 16 seconds from Dartford Harriers’ Kiera Pingo. She was followed by Caroline Fenwick (10th & 1st W45), Hannah Sangan (12th), Sophie Day (20th & 3rd W35), and Heather Fitzmaurice (30th & 2nd W55).
In the men’s race, the Sevenoaks team was weakened by the absence of some key runners but still secured 5th place. The team was led home by Andrew Hutchinson (23rd), closely followed by Keith Dowson (49th & 2nd M60), Christopher Dick (52nd), Dan Chaplin (56th), and Dan Witt (68th). The other scoring members of the team were Andy Ashlee (97th), Seb Naughton (107th), and Adam Bates (124th).
Once again, there were great performances by our older runners, with Sally Shewell 3rd W65 and Jeremy Winter 2nd M70.
The full SAC results were:
| Ov Pos | Lg Pos | Bib | Runner | Age | Time | Club | Score | Rtg | # |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 | 23 | 775 | Andrew Hutchinson | 46 | 33:54 | Sevenoaks AC | V40:1 | 92.33 | 32 |
| 31 | 1 | 1140 | Andrea Berquez | 40 | 34:32 | Sevenoaks AC | V35 | 100.00 | 18 |
| 49 | 46 | 764 | Keith Dowson | 62 | 35:37 | Sevenoaks AC | V60 | 84.32 | 28 |
| 52 | 49 | 763 | Christopher Dick | 34 | 35:41 | Sevenoaks AC | M1 | 83.28 | 5 |
| 56 | 53 | 760 | Daniel Chaplin | 43 | 35:50 | Sevenoaks AC | V40:2 | 81.88 | 3 |
| 68 | 62 | 801 | Daniel Witt | 50 | 36:54 | Sevenoaks AC | V50:1 | 78.75 | 83 |
| 81 | 10 | 768 | Caroline Fenwick | 48 | 37:31 | Sevenoaks AC | V45 | 94.38 | 18 |
| 89 | 12 | 1066 | Hannah Sangan | 31 | 38:02 | Sevenoaks AC | F1 | 93.12 | 11 |
| 97 | 83 | 754 | Andrew Ashlee | 56 | 38:30 | Sevenoaks AC | V50:2 | 71.43 | 38 |
| 107 | 90 | 787 | Sebastian Naughton | 51 | 39:13 | Sevenoaks AC | M2 | 68.99 | 23 |
| 124 | 105 | 757 | Adam Bates | 42 | 40:14 | Sevenoaks AC | M3 | 63.76 | 16 |
| 125 | 106 | 752 | Brian Allen | 54 | 40:21 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 63.41 | 16 |
| 128 | 20 | 762 | Sophie Day | 37 | 40:26 | Sevenoaks AC | F2 | 88.12 | 9 |
| 137 | 117 | 761 | Neil Colvin | 69 | 40:51 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 59.58 | 4 |
| 142 | 120 | 1103 | Andrew Bradley | 61 | 41:03 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 58.54 | 3 |
| 149 | 127 | 756 | James Baker | 61 | 41:19 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 56.10 | 37 |
| 166 | 30 | 769 | Heather Fitzmaurice | 56 | 41:51 | Sevenoaks AC | V55 | 81.88 | 89 |
| 167 | 137 | 777 | David Killpack | 40 | 42:06 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 52.61 | 18 |
| 210 | 170 | 766 | Andrew Evans | 55 | 44:34 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 41.11 | 64 |
| 243 | 192 | 780 | Leonard Lai King | 46 | 46:19 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 33.45 | 24 |
| 248 | 54 | 792 | Sarah Philpott | 47 | 46:35 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 66.88 | 12 |
| 249 | 195 | 784 | Simon Mann | 45 | 46:37 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 32.40 | 8 |
| 260 | 202 | 800 | Jeremy Winter | 72 | 47:28 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 29.97 | 20 |
| 348 | 98 | 793 | Sarah Shewell | 66 | 53:20 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 39.38 | 137 |
| 404 | 133 | 755 | Maria Ashlee | 54 | 1:00:28 | Sevenoaks AC | NS | 17.50 | 7 |
The full results are here.
Women’s team Captain, Caroline Fenwick said 'On Friday it was looking like we might not have a women's team, and so a big thank you to all the ladies who came together to make the trip to Betteshanger. Andrea Berquez stepped in at the last minute to help, she then led a great battle with Kiera Pingo from Dartford Harriers to take the win, giving the results a great boost. Sophie Day took a tumble but carried on to come in the top 20. A special thank you to Maria Ashlee for her support with the team.'
Men’s team captain, Dan Witt said “Obviously the women's team performance eclipses the men's but I would just say that all the runners making the journey to get to Deal all put in a bit extra to try to make up for our lack in numbers. Andrew Hutchinson ran really well to lead the team home with one of his strongest runs in many years, despite being in marathon training mode, having completed a half marathon run only the day before.
The women’s team is still in 2nd place in the series behind Canterbury Harriers. The men’s team placed 6th on the day but remain in 5th place in the series. The combined team is now in 3rd place, only 2 points behind Thanet Road Runners. If all the team can be fit for the remaining two races, it should be possible to overtake Thanet and secure 2nd place. The runners now have a 4-week rest before the 6th race in the series in AllHallows near Rochester on February 8th.
The Kent Fitness League is a series of cross-country races between the 18 registered Athletics Clubs in Kent. Any number of club members can compete, but 13 are needed to score in the team competition – 8 men (of whom one must be aged 60+, two must be 50+ and two 40+) and 5 women (of whom one must be aged 55+ one 45+ and one 35+).