Harrier Life member Frank Tickner of Bruton scored another front-running victory in the World XC Trials incorporated into the British Universities Championships at Bath on Saturday 3 February. Frank led all the way in conditions that were as sunny as the Great Britain Team will find at the IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Mombasa, Kenya, on 24 March – but, after a night of hard frost, probably 25° Celsius cooler.
Frank kept ahead of the field all the way round the hilly course and finished in 33:13 with Ben Noad (Highgate Harriers) in 2nd place in 33:21. The first three over the line are automatically selected for the Team GB World XC Championships. They join pre-selected Mo Farah (Newham and Essex Beagles). The full Senior Teams will be announced in the middle of next week so that they can all make arrangements to go to an acclimatisation camp arranged by UK Athletics in Durban, South Africa, to fully prepare for the steamy conditions in Mombasa.
Frank is in the final year of his English and French degree course at Birmingham University and said after winning the national title for the second successive winter: “I went in with the mindset of just focusing on the University championships and not the World Champs. I knew I would have to push it up the hills. Now I need to talk to my mentor, Clive Thomas, to see whether I can go to Durban and fit in my month of final exams. I’m ridiculously busy with work.”
Frank also competed for Team GB at last year’s World Championships in Japan, and more recently at the European XC Champs in Italy. Frank’s elder brother, also a World XC competitor from 2005, finished 16th at the Bath Uni event in a time of 34.27, which was good enough for 7th in the Universities Championships. Frank and Ben were consequently part of the Gold medal winning Birmingham University team.
Two other Harriers also competed well at the Championships. Pete Grist finished in 61st place overall, 46th in the Universities, in a time of 36.58.
Andy Baker was just behind Pete in a time of 37.02 (65th overall; 51st in Universities Championships)