BRITISH MASTERS 5km ROAD CHAMPS - Battersea Park

The final British Masters Championship of 2025 for Southampton AC Masters was the 5km Road Championships in Battersea Park. 

It was a great turn out in numbers for the Red & Whites with teams in the Men’s M35, M45 & M55 age categories and a Ladies debut in the  W35 team category. 

It was 2 individual Silver medals from Sarah Winstone and Matt Revier that stole the show both leading their respective teams to team honours. 

The Men’s M35 team travelled as defending Champions and were soon to the fore of the field. 

Matt Revier, 2nd last year, took runners up spot again this year in 15:12 and although disappointed not to go one better proved he is up there with the best and continue his fantastic form from a successful track season. 

Richard Waldron who has been in fantastic form of late after a recent Hampshire 10km call up, carried on where he left off proving age is just a number as he romped to a personal best 15:34. 

Matt Coffey, like Revier, part of the Gold medal winning team in 2024 ran a strong solid performance with 16:34 to complete the scoring team and successfully defend their title! 

It was great to see Ross Fripp competing on his Masters debut finishing in 17:11 to provide 

fantastic team back up after long term injury and look forward to seeing more from him in 2026. 

Sarah Winstone finished a fantastic 2nd in a time of 17:43 to claim individual Silver and after an injury ravaged 4 months was over the moon with her performance. 

The Ladies making their team debut at this Championship scorched to the Silver medals with Amanda Miles running superbly for her fastest time of the year in 19:26 while Gisela Hoppe down-aged to the younger age category to complete the scoring team and in the process earn herself a fantastic personal best with 20:13. 

It was the first British medals for Amanda & Gisela with the latter winning her second medal of the weekend after an individual Bronze at the Southern Masters Cross Country the day before. 

The Men’s M45 team of Jeremy Curtis (16:22), Emlyn Hughes (16:40), Kit Lau (17:17), Matthew Crocker (19:26), and Jim Bennett (20:08) all ran to their very best just missing the bronze medals by 3secs on accumulative time.  

Emlyn smashed the 17min barrier for the first time, just before his 50th birthday, Kit and Matthew both ran personal bests, Jeremy ran within 3 secs of his lifetime best posted in 2012 and Jim continued his return to running after heart surgery with a seasons best by over a minute. 

The M55 team of Jon Grainger (20:00), Ian Harpur (20:09), Andy Morgan-Lee (20:48), Scott Augur (21:00) finished 6th team, all running fastest times of the year.