What a pleasant evening for a fell race.  Well, it is more of a trail race than a true fell race.  There are no serious steep ascents and it is on good paths over the hills.  It therefore suited speedy runners such as Ben Coop of Bury AC,  who absolutely flew round to comfortably take the honours.  Oliver Heaton was in second place and was chased by Andy Collins throughout the race.  However, early on, Andy suffered a fall and although nothing was damaged other than his pride, at that point, Oliver opened up a gap of around twenty seconds.  Although Andy pushed hard, he found it impossible to close that gap which remained until the end of the race.  Still a cracking race by Andy to finish third.

Stephen Shorrock got off to a good start and was well placed in the top ten the first time they went passed the cross.  However, on the return, he was in 4th place behind Andy and despite being pushed by a couple of runners, he managed to hold this position to the end.  That was the second Barlcker in the top ten.

They say that a man is just as old as the woman he feels.  Well something is inspiring Carl Pawson.  At the weekend, he finished in 8th position.  In this race, he was in the same position when he first went passed the cross but on his return, he had managed to improve by one position and so it finished, with three Barlickers in the top ten. In this race, it was the less elitist four to count for the men's team prize and Zac Kaye finishing in 16th position, just one second in front of Ben Whitehead, meant that Barlick took the men's team prize.

Further down the field, Glenn Whittaker and John Boothman were battling it out for the the Whitman Cup.  It was a very close thing, but in the end John just managed to get ahead of Glenn.

Whilst all this was going on, there was also the ladies race taking place.  On the outward leg, Jackie Collins had a good lead and looked really up for it, doing star jumps over the muddy patches.  Again, on the outward leg, Lorraine Slater was in second place and knowing her prowess in longer races, would she be able to pull back on Jackie's lead?  By the time they returned, Jackie was still doing her star jumps, but Lorraine looked to be really struggling.  It turned out that she had only just returned from chilling out on a  cruise in the Mediterranean, which she admitted was not the best preparation for a race.  Nevertheless, it was a great performance from a woman who is only just still within the W45 category.  Further down the field, Paula Cullen was battling away and was rewarded with 6th position which meant that Barlick also won the ladies' team prize.  

What with individual prizes, category prizes and team prizes, the Barlick table looked overloaded by the end of the evening, but it concluded a good evening of fell running.

3 Andy Collins 50:00
4 Stephen Shorrock 51:32 (1st M40)
7 Carl Pawson 53:22 (1st M45)
16 Zac Kaye 56:40
17 Ben Whitehead 56:41
33 David Pease 1:01:21
38 Jacqueline Collins 1:01:57 (1st lady)
46 Lorraine Slater 1:04:19 (2nd lady)
52 John Boothman 1:05:00
55 Glenn Whittaker 1:05:20
79 Paula Cullen 1;11:17 (6th lady)
112 Katie Towers 1:18:33 (17th lady)

26 Lucy Beresford 24:39 New PB