Cross-Country Running

The Scoring System in the Surrey Leagues

In the men's league, the first ten runners score for their club. The league simply adds up scorer's finishing positions, so the aim for each club is to record the lowest aggregate score. There are penalties if fewer than 10 runners cross the finishing line: the missing runners are given the score of the last runner in the whole race. Clubs which are unable to field a full team of 10 or more can thus be heavily penalised. So we are always keen to get as many runners as possible of whatever standard to compete in our cross-country races. And, clearly, runners who are not very fast could still make a significant difference to Holland's final league position by completing the race in a scoring position on those occasions when we are short of numbers through injuries or for other reasons.

In the women's league a different system operates for calculating team scores. There are 5 scorers per team. But not only do the first five finishers score for their club as a team, those further back also count for their club because the league automatically creates further "virtual" teams until all the runners are accounted for. So A, B and C teams etc may be listed for a given club when the results are produced. This has the advantage of giving every runner an opportunity to score for their club, regardless of where they finish overall.