Friday is your last day to enter the biggest event in the English cross country calendar.

The English National Cross Country Championships will take place on Saturday, February 23 and entries are set to close this Friday (January 11).

The National will be hosted at the Harewood House Estate, near Leeds for the first time after taking place for a record 16th time at Parliament Hill in 2018.

The large estate allows for an expansive and challenging event which was witnessed last year at the North of England Championships.

Such is the beauty of cross country, all levels of athletes will get the chance to start together to take on the course, with events ranging from under 13s to senior level throughout the day. The under-17 women start the day at 11:00am and a full day of racing concludes with the senior men at 3:00pm.

Athletes run and represent their club, so get your club mates to enter with you and it can be a great day out for all. A muddy, wet, exhausting day out, but the mud is all part of the fun.

Online entry for the National can be found here.

Last year’s winners

Last year’s winners, Adam Hickey and Phoebe Law, will hopefully be back. Hickey was in fine form last weekend when winning the Essex County Country Cross Championships.

The Southend AC star will be one of the favourites for the title, but more will be known about form over the mud once we have seen the regional championships before the big day.

It could be that athletes will have gained an advantage from racing at Harewood House Estate for the Northern Championships last January, where Mhairi MacLennan and Carl Avery were victorious.

Athletes like Claire Duck, Jess Judd and Tonbridge AC’s Lucy Reid have all been running well and were winners at their county Championships last weekend. Both second and third from last year’s National, Louise Small and Iona Lake, were first past the post at their own championships as well.

Get a good idea of who is currently running well from the County Cross Country Championships report, which can be found here.

Welsh and Scottish Champs

The Welsh National Cross Country Championships are on the same weekend and entries close at midday on Friday February 2, but entries must be made through your club.

The Lindsay’s Scottish National Cross Country Champs are also on February 23 and entry forms can be requested on the Scottish Athletics website here. It is worth noting that the Scottish Championships will be run over an equal distance of 10km for both senior males and females, just as the World Championships in Aarhus will be.

RELATED: Weekend round up of all the cross country action.

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