Rutland School Sports Cross Country Championships - 26th September 2025
Rutland School Sports
Cross Country Championships
26th September 2025
A quiet end to September afforded me time to take the camera along to Rutland Water for this well-attended, slickly executed event, whilst watching my boy compete amongst the yr5’s.
It was amazing to hear from Mrs Crellin and Mr Thomas that Rutland's coordinated inter-school cross country championship has been running for thirty years!
For logistical reasons the course had changed for 2025, now set to the west of Sykes Lane instead of the usual route down the dam with the daunting return climb. The new weaving and winding layout seemed well received and remained just as demanding given the pace many of the runners (mostly!) maintained throughout. Even the hare’s commented on this each time they came past me...those guys I should add, ran a total distance of approx. 11.4km, so a shout out to them!
Anyway, as you'll see in the photos, the usual mixture of emotions were on show: red faces, stitches, and tears, but also much determination, some children literally just cruising it, plenty of smiles, shouts of support and camaraderie throughout. Oh, and DJ Steve did his thing, which I think was a first for the cross country - Pink Pony Club sounded great even at the far end of the course and kept everyone going! Notable to me was the pride and humility shown by all of the children during the presentation; it was wonderful to see and exemplifies why sport in schools remains vital.
I always forget to remind myself what a mission photographing these races can be, particularly with the younger groups covering shorter distances: not only do they remain more clustered, there's also just one real opportunity to take the shot! Having the older children running an extra lap or taking a more diverse route provides scope to move about, so I did better capturing most, if not all of them.
It wasn't the brightest of days despite the calm weather, but the sun made a brief appearance for the year six girls. And at least it was decent enough with ideal ground conditions.
There are a lot of photos (over 400) so I thought it best to organise them in year group/race order, rather than trying to sort out which belong to each school etc. As always, please only download and post pictures of your children on socials, unless you have further permission. If you require the login/password, please ask your school or contact me directly.
A quiet end to September afforded me time to take the camera along to Rutland Water for this well-attended, slickly executed event, whilst watching my boy compete amongst the yr5’s.
It was amazing to hear from Mrs Crellin and Mr Thomas that Rutland's coordinated inter-school cross country championship has been running for thirty years!
For logistical reasons the course had changed for 2025, now set to the west of Sykes Lane instead of the usual route down the dam with the daunting return climb. The new weaving and winding layout seemed well received and remained just as demanding given the pace many of the runners (mostly!) maintained throughout. Even the hare’s commented on this each time they came past me...those guys I should add, ran a total distance of approx. 11.4km, so a shout out to them!
Anyway, as you'll see in the photos, the usual mixture of emotions were on show: red faces, stitches, and tears, but also much determination, some children literally just cruising it, plenty of smiles, shouts of support and camaraderie throughout. Oh, and DJ Steve did his thing, which I think was a first for the cross country - Pink Pony Club sounded great even at the far end of the course and kept everyone going! Notable to me was the pride and humility shown by all of the children during the presentation; it was wonderful to see and exemplifies why sport in schools remains vital.
I always forget to remind myself what a mission photographing these races can be, particularly with the younger groups covering shorter distances: not only do they remain more clustered, there's also just one real opportunity to take the shot! Having the older children running an extra lap or taking a more diverse route provides scope to move about, so I did better capturing most, if not all of them.
It wasn't the brightest of days despite the calm weather, but the sun made a brief appearance for the year six girls. And at least it was decent enough with ideal ground conditions.
There are a lot of photos (over 400) so I thought it best to organise them in year group/race order, rather than trying to sort out which belong to each school etc. As always, please only download and post pictures of your children on socials, unless you have further permission. If you require the login/password, please ask your school or contact me directly.
