Words by Nina Cameron
The Sherman Cup has quite a long history: its name comes from Sherman’s Football
Pools, who donated the trophy to the local cross-country league in 1949. This is the
men’s trophy; the women’s trophy was introduced in 2002 so that women could have
a competition alongside the men.
The Sherman Cup in many ways feels and looks like a Harrier League event, but
there are some key differences. There are no packs (it’s a bit of a treat for the
medium and fast pack runners to start with everyone else). In both the men’s and
women’s competition, the combined points from all the various junior races and the
senior races are added up by club; seniors and vets count in separate teams.
Therefore it pays to have as many teams in as many categories as possible and so it
was great to see lots of juniors competing.
The course was the “traditional” way round. There was a fair amount of bogginess on
the outward stretch for some lost shoes and enough water for the water jump to add
some interest. The only downside to this course is the amount of tarmac path it
contains.
Davison Shield
The U15 girls team made a huge contribution to the overall score as we were only
able to field two teams (U15 and vets), but, unfortunately, we didn’t have a senior
team competing. Nevertheless, we were still placed 8 th overall. Ellie Reed was 1 st
V35 and first counter in the vets team.
Sherman Cup
Heaton was able to score in 3 categories this year: U13s, Seniors and Vets and so
finished a very creditable 7 th place overall. The senior and vet men were out in force
for this one, showing the strength in numbers which is key to XC success in all
competitions. The first Heaton Harrier home for the men was James McKenzie, who
was the first counter for the vets team. Just a few seconds behind him was Oscar
Reid, who was the first counter in the senior team. Ian Norman was first in his age
category.
There were lots of excellent individual performance across all the races: well done to
everyone who competed – juniors, seniors and vets.
Full results can be found on the Start Fitness Harrier League website.
http://www.harrierleague.com/results/2024-25/Cup-shield/ShermanCup.htm