Newark on Saturday 13/03/1999 8 Km (Senior Ladies)

The sixty-seventh Senior Women's National Cross-Country Championships took place at Newark, Nottinghamshire. The race was sponsored by View From and was 8km in length and mainly flat.

Defending champion Mara Myers (Parkside AC) was in the Far East working as a diplomat for the Foreign Office. Andrea Whitcombe (Parkside AC) was hoping to add to her trio of individual titles. Others thought to be in with a chance of making the podium were Liz Talbot (Bedford & County AC), Lucy Elliott (Shaftesbury Barnet Harriers) and Lucy Wright (Leeds City AC). Parkside has dominated the individual race since Paula Radcliffe won for Bedford & County AC in 1994.

The County Showground was heavy going for the athletes who toed the line. The early leaders were Liz Talbot and Sharon Morris (Hertford & Ware AC). Just behind were Whitcombe, Elliott, Bev Jenkins and Sarah Young both from Salford Harriers. Lucy Wright moved through the field and established a 10-metre lead over Talbot and Whitcombe with Angela Newport (Basingstoke & Mid Hants AC) moving through to fourth. At the start of the second lap Wright had increased her lead to 15m but was caught by Whitcombe and Talbot on the muddiest section by the copse. This trio were 150m clear of Morris and Newport and a further 50 metres back were Bev Hartigan (Birchfield Harriers) and Jenkins. Wright began to falter and Talbot and Whitcombe battled for the lead. Into the last kilometre the runners faced a headwind, Newport was closing the gap on the front two after passing Wright. Newport caught Whitcombe and Talbot with 300 metres to go and used her faster finish to claim the title with just three seconds covering the first three home, silver went to Whitcombe and the bronze to Talbot.

Primary school teacher Angela Newport described the end of the race to Athletics Weekly: "Beforehand I had agreed with George (Gandy) that in a long race so much can happen in the second half. And George talked about this course being quite deceptive - it looks flat and ordinary, but it's quite tiring. "With 2000m to go, I was fourth and told myself that's the worst place to be - one out of the medals. I thought the first two had got away. But with 1000 to go, I'd just taken Lucy and I thought, 'It's like a track rep now.' "I realised I was getting closer to the first two and with 400 to go, George shouted: 'Time it right!' With 300 to go, I pulled alongside Liz and, as I did, Andrea took the lead. I don't know how far there was to go when I got in front..."

Shaftesbury Barnet Harriers successfully defended their team title beating Salford Harriers by 61 points, Parkside AC were third. Counters for Shaftesbury Barnet were Lucy Elliott (8th), Angela Joiner (10th), S Vangraan (13th) and Lisa Hollick (26th).