NESTL Rowntree men's team produced a great performance at the Northern Cross Country championship at Derby.

Over 12 kilometres of hilly, muddy terrain, Nestl took seventh place, the best performance by a York club at the event for over a decade.

Nestl were superbly led home by Paul Goble in 62nd place and there was excellent packing with Andy Burt (83rd), Steve Simpson (86), Bob Duncan (95) and Andy Hilton (101) close together in a field of close to 500. Mike Raynes completed the team in 191st place.

The Nestl team will now hopefully achieve further records at the National Championships at Bristol in a month's time.

In the last race at Richmond an under-strength squad earned second team position with Steve Simpson (11), Bob Duncan (18), Andy Hilton (26), Andy Normandale (29), Colin Hawxby (32) and Steve Ratcliffe (33) making up the team.

At Richmond, Julie Simpson (14), Aimee Collett (25) and Joanne Simpson (26) all finished.

Within the junior section, the outstanding performance of any Nestl runner at Derby was that of Nina Griffith, who was placed sixth in the under-17 category - and in borrowed spikes to boot.

It was Nina's best result of an exceptional season which has seen her finish second overall in the West Yorks League and finish eighth in the Yorkshire championships.

In the under 13 race, Emma Astin was 65th and in the under 15 race Emma Astin was 35th. In the junior women's race Susanna Dale was 16th and Helen Garnham 20th.

Updated: 11:58 Tuesday, January 29, 2002