Local Clubs unite to compete with best in North at Relays

Last Saturday saw Ellesmere Port Running Club and West Cheshire AC join forces to produce a combined team to compete at the North of England 12 stage road relays held at Heaton Park, Manchester.

The relay consisted of 8 short legs of 5 kilometres and 4 long legs of 8 kilometres although the latter was widely agreed to be slightly longer, based on finishing times. Morpeth Harriers & AC were the overall winners with Sale Harriers Manchester second and Leeds City AC third.

West Cheshire's Paul Frodsham kicked off proceedings and completed the first long leg in 31.06. Steve Crowe ran the shorter second leg of 5K crossing the line in 17.23 to release Graham McNeil (WC) who produced a time of 16.23. Denis Duret ran the longer 4 th leg in a satisfactory time of 31.37. Simon Jeffs showed a massive improvement in form after producing a superb 5K time of 16.55 on the 5 th leg. Danny Legg was next to go and tackled the short course in 18.53 to unleash Matt Whitfield running the long 7 th leg which Matt completed in a fast time of 32.46. Gary Munsey (WC) negotiated the 8 th leg in 18.33 and released EPRC's coach Tony Smith to tackle the 9 th leg in 20.37. Kenny Begley (WC) tackled the 10 th long leg in 31.47 and set up the final runner Graham Jenkins (WC) who finished the 11 th leg in 17.38. Unfortunately due to last minute commitments the team could not get a 12 th runner to complete the field, however the team were in 42 nd position out of 52 teams after the 11 th leg.

On the woman's race Nicola Bird competed solely and therefore could only run the first women's leg of 5K, however Nicky still came away happy with a personal best time of 17.10 for 9 th position of the leg.

The 6 th round of the Borders league was staged last Sunday with hosts Buckley Runners putting on a hilly 5 mile course starting and finishing at Mold Leisure Centre.

First runner home for Ellesmere Port was Ian Cooper who showed his injury woes are now behind him by finishing in his joint highest position of 9 th for a third time in 28.15.

Tony Hyland produced an excellent run and a strong finish to claim 20 th position and second counter for the club in 29.09 and was followed just behind by Steve Crowe who finished 22 nd in 29.14.

Matt Whitfield produced his second fine run in as many days finishing in his highest position this year of 50 th in 31.01. Danny Legg also running his second race of the weekend was the 5 th runner home for the club in 32.48 for 78 th position. Not far behind Danny came John Jennings who negotiated the course in 32.53 to secure 81 st place.

Steve Blaylock produced his best finishing position yet of 91 st in a handy 33.39 for the clubs 7 th counter. Les Fleetwood was the next runner to finish after tackling the hilly course in 34.58 for 117 th position.

Pete Jones 36.27 (140 th ) & Ian Robinson 36.41(146 th ) completed the scoring for the team after doing exceptionally well to claw back positions after they had missed the start by a few minutes.