Lymington Athlete, Lymington Triathlon Club and New Forest Runners’ Valeria Sesto, Hardley Runners’ Poppy Tanner, and Southampton AC duo Alice Burch and Lucy Harrison shone for Hampshire at the 2025 Intercounties Championships in Essex

Lymington’s Valeria Sesto and Hardley Runners Poppy Tanner shone for the Hampshire women’s team at the 2025 Intercounties Championships in Essex.

Competing in a four-person team in a 20-mile race, the two local runners, Lymington Athletes, Lymington Triathlon Club and New Forest Runners’ Sesto and Tanner, who lives in Marchwood, were the two highest placed Hampshire runners.

Tanner, 29, from the Waterside area, led the Hampshire ladies until the fourth lap, when veteran and eldest runner in the team, Sesto, tapped into her experience to push on through the last four miles and finished first Hampshire lady.

Tanner came in as the second Hampshire runner, with Alice Burch, 42, who lives in Ashurst and runs for Southampton AC, third, and Lucy Harrison, 33, also Southampton AC, in fourth.

“The girls performed very well”, said Hordle-based former international runner Kathy Bayley. “Some years, we have a stronger team than others. Yet it’s important to still have female athletes running within certain standards and willing to come and compete for their county.”

Sesto had planned to pull out two weeks ago after not training for personal reasons. However, coach Bailey told her that ‘everything had been paid for already’, and that she should ‘jog the course round and just enjoy the event’.

Sesto said: “Perhaps experience and knowing what to expect pays off after all. I always say I wish I could have run with this “head” ten or more years ago. But then, I wouldn’t have this confidence in the distance if I had not been through what I’ve been through since I started in 2007.”

The event is run on an airfield near Saffron Walden and Stansted called Audley End Airfield, with competitors racing around the four-mile flat circuit five times.

This year’s conditions were a little better than in the past few years. It was still minus zero temperatures to start with, but it wasn’t raining, and the wind didn’t pick up until halfway through the event.