Todmorden Harriers ladies made up 1 in 8 of the field for the final English Fell Championship race at Hodder Valley near the Forest of Bowland. Lucy Burnett led the team home to a take fifth place in the team competition. Tod’s second and third counters. Mel Blackhurst and Kath Brierley, also took 4th place in their age categories with Jane Leonard bringing the team home.
Todmorden Harriers saved their strongest men’s team for this final English Fell Championship race of 2014 resulting in a fine 6th place overall.
Although only 4 miles in distance, the 1500 feet of ascent made this a very tough race. After a short flat start the first climb had most runners walking. A brief respite from the climb was followed by a steeper climb and a lung bursting walk to the top when runners were free to career back down to the show field.
The men’s race was won in an amazing time of 32.44 by veteran Morgan Donnelly. Todmorden’s closest challenger was Jon Wright in a time of 39.00 holding off the challenge of team mate Nick Barber. Ben Crowther, Paul Hobbs and Craig Stansfield battled it out with just 40 seconds separating them and Dave Gardner completed the team sneaking in in 99th place.
Results:
Position Men’s Race Time
38 Jon Wright 39.00
41 Nick Barber 39.17
57 Ben Crowther 40.36
61 Paul Hobbs 40.52
68 Craig Stansfield 41.16
99 Dave Gardner 43.20
101 Ivan Gee 43.29
134 Dan Taylor 46.29
175 Paul Brannigan 53.09
181 David Leslie 54.02
201 Dave O’Neil 72.51
202 Runners
Position Ladies Time
10 Lucy Burnett 46.25
27 Mel Blackhurst 49.39
47 Kath Brierley 54.19
51 Jane Leonard 56.00
57 Kirsty Patten 57.59
63 Catherine Elvin 60.09
66 Andrea Taylor 62.27
67 Sue Roberts 62.43
70 Moira Parfitt 63.55
72 Mandy Goth 64.06