A total of 206 girls and 248 boys, from 25 government, church and private schools, were present at the Marsa Sports Ground last week to take part in the annual cross country events organised by Athletics Malta during the first semester.

This was a marked improvement over recent years and the competition was as keen as could be, with vociferous support filling the wet wintry air, seemingly in defiance of the threatening rain.

In the events for boys, De La Salle College were in their customary dominant form.

Indeed, the best result of the day belonged to them when their scoring foursome of Matthew Grech Soler, Isaac Bonnici, Julian Zarb and Mark Azzopardi finished exactly in that order to win in the best possible score in the Primary Schools’ race.

De La Salle went on to win the event for the older youths, again in a strong commanding position.

Another school to leave its mark, albeit by taking part in all events, was San Anton, ever present among the winners in these competitions.

They won the event for girls from Primary Schools, were second in both junior and senior girls and their boys finished third in the senior event.

The other top winners were the National Sports School. They were first in the junior girls, had two second places (obtained by their boys in the junior and senior events), and third with their senior girls.

Other schools that did well included St Martin’s, first in the junior boys and second in the primary girls, and the athletes from St Joseph (Blata l-Bajda) who triumphed in the cross country race for senior girls.

The St Monica (Birkirkara) girls were third in two events, those for the primary and junior levels.

Last but not least, St Edward’s, another college with a good reputation in this sport, had to be content with a second spot in the primaries, where they were followed by the San Andrea boys, and with the third placing in the event for juniors.