Category Archive Seniors Fell

Buckden Pike FR Saturday 15th June

27 Clayton Harriers  – 6 ladies; 21 men – made the short trip to the English Fell Championship counter at Buckden Park on Saturday. Jean Brown was our first lady home in 27th place (11th LV40), followed by Wendy Dodds (49th;1st LV60) and Alison Dugdale (56th). Linda Lord also won the LV65 category, while Katy Thompson and Nichola Horsfall completed the sextet. Jean, Wendy and Alison were 5th LV40 team.

Star male performer was again Mike Wallis who finished 64th in a high quality field, pipped for 1st place in the MV55 category by Dave Neild. Captain Dave Motley ran well to claim 84th place, with Chris Balderson our third counter in 105th. Kieran Carr’s go-faster haircut helped him to third place in the MV65 category. The MV50 team: Mike, Dave Naughton and Pete Booth were 4th. After the race, 15 men enjoyed a few beers and a meal in the Buck Inn before taking a leisurely route home via Skipton, which included rather more pub stops than was good for us! A good night was had by all. Thanks to Gary Balmer for organising the trip.

Ladies Results

Men’s Results

Hendon Brook Half Marathon Sunday 16th June

There was strong Clayton presence at the Hendon Brook, organised superbly by John Roche and team: 33 runners, plus marshals, helpers and spectators. An amazing solo run By Tom Cornthwaite (Salford) saw him complete the challenging course in 1:15:29 breaking Roger Brewster’s long-standing record. Matt Lalor was again our best place runner in third (1:25:09). There were category wins for John Hartley (M55), Irene Roche (F55), Mevyn Thistlethwaite (F60), Vicky Heys (F40) and Yvonne Wickham (F50). Special mention must be made of the 4 runners who survived the rigours of Buckden Pike and its aftermath to take part: Dave Motley, Richard Briscoe Dave Naughton, Gary Balmer. Chapeau.

Full results.

Members of Clayton-le-Moors Harriers were in action across many disciplines and in a range of events over the weekend.

New recruit, Anthony Gotts, a wheelchair athlete, took part in a number of events from 100m -5000m over two days at the England Athletics Open UK/IPC Meeting at Bedford Stadium. On Saturday, Anthony enjoyed a clear victory in his 800m race, just 0.1sec outside his personal best and finished fourth in the 5000m in a time of 13:11. On Sunday, Anthony set PBs in the 200m, 400m and, most notably in the 1500m when he improved by a massive 26 seconds.

Meanwhile, closer to home, Club President Dave Scott set a PB at the Burnley Parkrun on Saturday morning, before winning his age group at the Kelbrook Fell Race in the afternoon – at the tender age of 70! Other notable Clayton men’s performances at Kelbrook came from Dave Walker (7^th), Matt Perry (12^th), Tom Brewster (15^th ), Dave Motley (17^th), and Paul Hesketh (19^th/2^nd M45), while John Wilcock was first M50 and Steve Breckell first M60 in his first race for some time. Not to be outdone, the ladies also shone:  Vicky Heys (1^st F40), Irene Roche (1^st F55), Yvonne Wickham (1^st F50) and Karin Goss (1^st F60).

Over at the Wharfedale Off Road Marathon, Martin Terry finished in 15^th place to take the M50 prize and there were good performances from Ivan Whigham (33^rd), Bev and Peter Thompson (80^th & 81^st), while in the Half Marathon Jeff Pickup took first prize in the M60 category, with Dawn Richards and Lorna Balmer finishing in the top half of the field.

Also on Saturday, seven men made the journey north to compete in the first Lakeland Classic Long Race of the year: Duddon Valley Fell Race. First Clayton home, in 26^th place (2^nd M50) was Mike Wallis, followed by Dave Naughton (35^th) and Andy Orr (38^th). Chasing Andy hard all the way were Andy Robinson (39^th) – first in the over 60 category – and Pete Booth (42^nd;2^nd M60). Richard Bellaries completed the set in 77^th place while Alex Braysford was unfortunately forced to retire.

7 members were at the Pen-y-Ghent FR on Saturday and a contingent of ladies made the long journey to Kirk Yetholm in the Scottish borders to contest the British Championship FR.

On Sunday morning about 1600 runners lined up in Burnley town centre to take part in the Jane Tomlinson Pennine 10K Road Race. In-form Matt Lalor had another superb run to take second place, while Laura Hesketh was first female to cross the line, in 39^th place overall. Despite his exertions at Kelbrook on Saturday Tom Brewster was 5^th, followed by John Roche (17^th; 1^st M45), Alex Cran 18^th, Richard Briscoe (20^th) and Andrew Foster (30^th).  Many other Harriers took part in the event, helping to raise money for the Pendleside Hospice and other deserving charities.

Clayton-le-Moors Harriers scored a wonderful 1-2 at Saturday’s wet and windy Langdale Daffodil 10K road race. Barnoldswick’s Tom Brewster battled his way along flooded roads to record his first ever race win in 35:39, crossing the line just 22 seconds before club mate, Breton Holdsworth, recent winner of the Dentdale 14, in second place on this occasion. Tom’s win is the culmination of over two years of hard training that has seen him improve continuously and has included recent winning performances at the Burnley Parkrun. The icing on the cake was an 11^th place finish (1^st M55) for Tom’s dad, Roger – himself a winner of many races in the past – which gave Clayton Harriers the team award.

Meanwhile, three female members made the long journey to Northern Ireland to contest the first British Fell Race Championship counter, based at Silent Valley in the Mourne Mountains. After 10 miles and 4500’ of ascent over very rough terrain and in very testing conditions, our first counter was Jean Brown in 84^th position (14^th female) in 2:17:12, ably supported by Wendy Dodds (139^th; 1^st F60) and Katy Thompson (157^th). Their combined performance was good enough to give them 3^rd position in the female vets’ teams.

Finally, much further afield, Phil Hanson completed the gruelling Marathon des Sables in the Sahara Desert. Phil finished the 160 mile event in under 37 hours, which gave him 319^th place out of 970 finishers (over 1000 started).