Brett Rushman and Luke Dunham storm to national cross country success with stellar displays at Wollaton Park in Nottingham

Brett Rushman and Luke Dunham stormed to national cross country success with stellar displays in Nottingham on Saturday (March 8).

The former achieved the biggest victory of his career to date by winning the men’s race at the UK Athletics Cross Challenge Final and UK Inter Counties Championships.

And the latter secured a third-place finish in the under-17s race at Wollaton Park to land the overall series title.

Rushman, who went to Hockerill Anglo-European College in Bishop’s Stortford, and James Kingston pulled away from the rest of the field on the final lap in the men’s event.

They ran an intense lap side by side before Rushman took on the final hill with amazing strength to pull away and triumph by 10 seconds in 29min 45sec.

Rushman has had to overcome major health problems in the last few years, suffering from heart complications having been struck down with Covid on multiple occasions.

He has been in fine form recently, however, having also helped England under-23s win gold at the European Cross Country Championships in Turkey on his debut before Christmas.

In the under-17s race, Bishop’s Stortford High School student Dunham put in a number of surges at the front to break up the field on his way to third in a time of 19.13. Race winner Alex Lennon clocked 18.56.

Dunham, who, like Rushman, represents Ware-based Herts Phoenix Athletics Club, earned the overall Cross Challenge crown having also made the podium with third-placed finishes in Cardiff and Liverpool as well as coming second in Leeds.