Saturday saw Jacqui Watson tackle the 1st of the Essex cross country series of 10k’s that take place on the 2nd Saturday of the month from May to September. The first race was a 2 lap course round the beautiful Hylands Park in Chelmsford and Jacqui came a very respectable 10th lady home.
There was double delight for Ben Green and Victoria Hiscock at the Bluebell 5 mile on Sunday as they both cruised to easy victories for individual mens and womens glory in the local race that winds it’s way through Littlehavens Nature Reserve.
In his first race since securing a PB at the London Marathon, Ben eased into a lead on the 1st lap of the race and was never in danger of being caught coming home well clear of the 2nd place man in a time of 30.23 out of a field of 321 runners. Victoria had an excellent race and finished 5th overall, with a few minutes to spare over the 2nd lady. Just like Ben, she also won a specially carved wooden bowl… an ideal present the day before her 21st birthday!
Next home from BRC in 10th position was Ciaran Byrne, closely followed by Ciaran Doherty in 11th, Tim Tomlins 13th and Ian Pike in 17th place. Our 2nd lady home was Abbi-May Walters (43rd), with Nicola Evans our 3rd women back in 69th. We then had Ange Hall, Esther Wynn, Rob de Cristofano, Mandy Cooper, Dennis Dudley, Sarah de Cristofano, Debbie Roberston, Manuela Gordea, John Robertson, Kay Markwick, Caroline Dudley, Debbie Burton
Martin Folkes, Kevin Judge, Bev Small, Christine Judge, Bobby Oliver, Caron Hiscock, Jo Key, Annette Johnson, Jessica Ritchie, Sam Venton & Lee Allen all completing the course and making a grand total of 31 runners at the May ‘Race of the Month’
Over at the Rochford 10km there was another excellent run from Damian Harvey to take 3rd place in the race in a time of 37.22 on the off road course. Keeping the symmetry in place for BRC was Kiera Tippett who finished 3rd lady home in a time of 43.59 closely followed by Archie Conners competing in his first 10km race & a very respectable time of 44.12. After that we had Michael Waters, Kelly McClenaghan, Tom Robinson, Nikki Leigh, Richard Leigh who ran a 1m 30s PB & Liane Conners representing the club.
Further north in the county at the Halstead Marathon, which doubles up as the Essex Championship race, Ann Reed completed her 2nd marathon in 2 weeks in a time of 4.50 which was good enough to record a 5 minute course PB. Shortly after Ann and under the 5 hour mark was Sean Allison in 4.56.
Well done to all those BRC members that flew the flag this weekend and represented the club.