With some signs of spring in the air it was a busy weekend for athletics, with the Northern Athletics Cross Country Championships on Saturday in Tatton Park. Numbers were low for the Northerns, with just 211 women and 389 men, sadly no Wesham members entered, there was a half dozen from Blackpool and a reasonable team from Preston. It was a weekend for road running on Sunday, however, with the St Annes 10-Mile and the Morecambe Festival of Running.
The St Annes 10 was won by Wesham’s Adam Wilding as he continues to run from strength to strength. He crossed the line in pole position in 57:40 a clear minute ahead of second. Tom Crabtree finished 18th in 1:04:34 with Sue Coulthurst 6th female and 45th overall in 1:12:58, coming in 1st W55. Peter Rooney was 149th in 1:32:48 for 9th M65, and Alistair Morris finished 214th in 1:55:31, 13th M60. The first four runners were inside the hour with the winning women’s time 1:04:08, a good performance.
In the Morecambe Festival 10-Mile race from the Duke of Rothesay in Heysham with an out and back route along Morecambe Promenade Lee Barlow finished 12th in 1:08:29, to place 2nd M50. 54:44 was the winning time by two minutes, and there were three runners under the hour. The first two women were neck and neck, finishing two seconds apart at 1:14:26.
Martin Bates ran the Daffodil 10k in Stockport where he clocked exactly 1:02:00 with a chip time of 1:00:37, such was the large crowd at the start. He finished 854th and 14th M65, and there were 1262 runners in this very popular event. He had run the Worsley Woods parkrun course on Saturday after its cancellation due to the danger of falling trees.
There were 29 Wesham members running a parkrun on Saturday morning at 6 venues in the UK with one in Italy catching some winter sun. In the Finsbury parkrun in the very picturesque Finsbury Park itself Dan Bolton placed 10th in a good quality field in a time of 18:22, while in the Preston run in Avenham Park Steve Myerscough ran 21:50 and Nigel Shepherd 21:56, with Des Cleary on 25:09 with the three laps up the steep hill shortly after the start line. The Wesham Tourists went to Wythenshawe in Manchester, David Taylor was 3rd fastest in 19:52 and Carl Groome 14th with 21:50. Vicky Gore was 12th fastest female in 26:47 and Andy Moore clocked 29:03. Alona Versinina recorded 29:12 and Sue Rigby 38:05. Ryan Azzopardi ran the Widnes parkrun in 25:47. There was the largest Wesham contingent at the Blackpool run in Stanley Park with the cancellation of Lytham Hall after Friday’s Storm Eowyn caused toppling trees, where Adam Wilding ran the 4th fastest time of 18:42 with Ian Nichols Hogg next runner for the club in 22:42. Jonathan Lawson returned 22:46; Will Parkinson 23:38; Lee Barlow 23:45; Tom Crabtree on 26:02 running just ahead of Rob Wallace with 26:07; Jo McCaffery clocked 30:04 with Martin Allison on 32:45; Mary Lois Cortes ran 38:29; Emma Davies 40:38; and Philip Leaver walked to 56:36. There were four Wesham members at the Fleetwood Promenade run where John Naylor recorded 23:27; Carly Edgar 30:39; Alex Rowe 42:32 and Dave Young 47:57. Finally, in Lucca outside Pisa in Italy Mike Eyre ran 23:03 for 7th fastest, and Helen Eyre was 7th female in 29:48.