READING Athletic Club’s U17 men started the autumn/winter season in great style, with a splendid second place in the South of England Road Relay Championships at Bedford Autodrome on Sunday.

The U17 4x4.5km team of Matt Rawlings (14m 58secs), Nick Wiltshire (14m 57secs), Sam Rodda (14m 57secs) and Chey Blatchford-Kemp (14m 57secs) ran well to take second spot behind Shaftesbury.

The B team of Shreyas Kanyady (15m 33secs), Harry Roe (15m 44secs) and Max Martin (16m 25secs) were in 12th place at the end of the third leg, but Reading’s final stage runner was taken ill and unable to run, and sadly it was although too late to bring in a reserve.

For the incomplete C team, Adam Halbert and Tom Nike both ran determinedly to be in about 30th place at the end of stage two.

Ben Rollings was the star of Reading’s U15 team in their 4x3km race, gaining six positions on the final stage as he ran a time of 9m 22secs to help his team finish 16th.

The remainder of the team was Leon Bradshaw (10m 04secs), Joseph Mott (9m 47secs) and Tom Rickards (10m 23secs).

The incomplete B team featuring Alfie Thomas (10m 48secs), Sam Kral-Waters (11m 03secs) and Alfie McGlennon (10m 53secs) were 32nd at the end of stage three.

Reading’s U13 team were one runner short for their 4x3km race, but Elio Babb (11m 18secs), Laurie Baker (11m 14secs) and Hugo Domingos (11m 38secs) showed encouraging form for the rest of the campaign.