Athletics: Lynndale grab title after 12-year gap

Lynndale Harrier Club won the annual Auckland teams cross-country championship at Manukau City on Saturday - for the first time since 1988.

North Harbour Bays have won the event for the past six years, but despite their Jason Cameron and Mark Hutchinson taking the first two placings in the 10,000m race around Hayman Park, they lacked a higher-placed seventh runner to clinch the title again.

Lynndale had dominated the championship during the 1940s and 1950s, and over the past few years has been one of few clubs able to challenge North Harbour Bays.

To keep the race competitive, the number of runners to count was reduced to seven last year.

Cameron was signalling his return to the national cross-country scene after an absence of nearly two years. He last raced in the 1998 New Zealand championship in Dunedin, and has since battled a muscular disorder.

He had to work hard over the later part of the race to beat a determined Hutchinson, finishing just 4s ahead in 33m 24s. Vaughan Craddock, of the Auckland City Club, was third in 33m 58s.

Claire McKone won the combined senior and veteran women's race. McKone, a first-season veteran, ran the 7500m in 30m.

Auckland City won the senior teams event, while McKone's Takapuna club took the veteran teams event.

Auckland University won the veteran men's team title.