The first athletes to test the course were the Junior Women in their 6km race.

Faye FULLERTON came in one place behind Henrietta in 46th in 22:16 and said after the race:

"I'm quite pleased. It was a tough pace throughout the race but thestart was not as fast as I had expected. In the finishing straight I overtook six people because I knew that every position counts."

The Norwich Union GB Team finished in eighth place with 130 points, just two points behind France in seventh on 128 points.

ENDURANCE CASE STUDY: ST MARY’S COLLEGE TWICKENHAM

Tucked away in a small corner of south west London, St Mary’s college in Twickenham seems, at first, an unlikely base for some of the capital’s brightest young endurance athletes, when you consider the college doesn’t yet have an all-weather athletics track.

But sometimes, an over-emphasis on facilities can miss the point; St Mary’s college is succeeding in nurturing young talent not due to space-age buildings, but thanks to a burgeoning partnership between UK Athletics, the EIS, athletes and coaches and the college.

Since 2002, St Mary’s has been a satellite base for the EIS in London, offering applied physiology, strength and conditioning, physiotherapy, nutrition advice, performance lifestyle advice and medical care to a range of sports and teams, including the UKA Endurance athletes based there. Providing access to that level of service where athletes live and study, means that St Mary’s is more than the sum of its parts, as Mick Woods, UKA Performance Centre Manager explains.

“It’s become a one-stop-shop, if you like. Athletes can live here, study here and access key services from the EIS on a daily basis – whether it’s physiology, strength and conditioning or physiotherapy.

“Even with medical care – we have EIS Medical Director Roslyn Carbon and our own physician Bruce Hamilton here for one session each every week - athletes know that they can access a doctor twice every week on site, not just for injury problems but for other matters,” he said.

St Mary’s has two full-time World Class Performance athletes based on campus – Mo Farah and James McIlroy. Beneath that top strata there is a group of World Class Potential athletes - Faye Fullerton, Charlotte Dale, Jemma Simpson, Stephen Murphy and Darren Sinclair, and they are all able to access support from the EIS on campus.

“The key to the whole setup is a team approach between UKA, athletes, coaches and the EIS,” Woods says. “Because the athletes are here full time, it allows a greater deal of flexibility.

“If, for example, an athlete needs some strength and conditioning work, Raph Brandon, the EIS conditioning coach can normally fit around somebody’s academic or training schedule. Similarly, that’s the case with physiological and physiotherapy support too.

“Building up those relationships on a personal level helps enormously. Sometimes, accessing support can be as simple as just wandering by and having a five-minute chat with somebody at the EIS, but that can really benefit people.”

Primarily Woods’ role on campus is to make sure the athletes based at St Mary’s get the level of service they need to succeed at the highest level by working with athletes, coaches and EIS support staff.

“I’d like to see St Mary’s grow, by witnessing more athletes wanting to come and study here. The demand for funded scholarships and programmes is too high for us to cope with, but if we can attract athletes and encourage them to come and study here, hopefully they can benefit from the high performance environment.”

With a new all weather track due to be laid St Mary’s can only get better, according to Woods.

“From my point of view, I don’t see any problems with the level of service we’re getting from the EIS at St Mary’s. We can always get our Performance and Potential level athletes into physiotherapy, strength and conditioning and physiology whenever necessary.”

“You have a nice, compact campus and the local parks - Richmond Park and Bushy Park - are ideal for endurance athletes. It’s already a really good training base for endurance athletes and with an all-weather track on the way, St Mary’s can only improve.”

European Cross-country

Pre-race: Euro xc: “This will be my fourth major cross country championship as a Junior – and I shall be a lot further on with my fitness in Edinburgh than I was for the Trial three weeks ago.”

Faye was 5th in the Junior race at the European Cross-country in Edinburgh in a time of 16.07. Great Britain took the team Gold medal.

Faye said: “I’m really pleased! I wanted to finish in the top ten initially and then in the top five as I got fitter this winter. But after the Trial at Liverpool, I had to really ease off the training [as a precaution]. The crowd encouraged me; there were lots of faces I knew. I had a bad patch at the beginning of the second lap but then I picked up again, relaxed and just kept the momentum going. I was all-in coming into the finish, but knowing we had a Team medal kept me going.”

Team Coach Angela Newport said: “Faye ran a brilliant race, too. The girls ran sensible races and were strong at the end. They ran with their heads, like experienced international runners.”

At the English Nationals Faye Fullerton added the National U20 Cross Country title to her u17 title from 2001 at Durham, enjoyed another trip up North from her base at the UK Athletics Endurance Performance Centre at St Mary’s University Twickenham. After a sluggish start she same through for a clear win by 15 seconds from Loughborough University-based steeplechaser Bryony Frost (Isle of Wight) over the very hilly course in Leeds.

But success wasn’t as routine as it looked. Fullerton, does much of her training close to Hampton Court in West London. But she said of her race at what Yorkshire folk call the North’s equivalent of Hampton Court: “I got the worst start; must have been in the 40s. I thought maybe I could still get a medal but I didn’t think I could win until there was maybe a mile to go.” 

The mould for the women's 5 km race was set early on as favourite Hayley Yelling (Windsor, Slough, Eton and Hounslow) took it out from almost the start.  Yelling, who helped Britain to win the team Gold medals in the senior women's championship at the Europeans in Edinburgh last December, held a commanding lead at the half-way stage with Natalie Harvey-Firth (South London Harriers) in second spot just ahead of Kate Reed (Bristol and West) with Faye Fullerton (Havering Mayesbrook), Helen Clitheroe (Preston), Charlotte Dale (Invicta East Kent) and Susan Partridge (City of Glasgow) in pursuit.