BOLTON'S senior men’s team continued where they left off at Leigh and romped to a convincing win in the Red Rose Cross Country race at Hyndburn.

With Tom Carson winning in impressive style, the Leverhulme Park men thrashed the opposition as they finished with 59 points to Blackburn’s 156.

Horizontal rain in Accrington heralded the start of the challenging conditions of cross country, with the traditional mud in abundance on the wooded course.

Not that the terrain of this second round fixture made one jot of difference to the Bolton men.

Undoubtedly bolstering the squad as he returned to a Blue Vest for team competition for the first time in two years, a refocused Carson jogged round to win in 37mins 38secs, with Leigh’s Dave Smith 11 seconds behind.

It capped a fine week for Carson after being invited to join the Great Britain Triathlon age-group squad for the Sprint Distance European Championships in Lisbon, Portugal in May next year.

Less than a minute behind, Tommy Harrison continued his spectacular 2015 by completing the 10k over three laps in fourth position, while Jonny Kay’s ninth was excellent as he readjusts to the endurance distances.

The three top-10 finishers were joined by Phil Marsden (debuting in cross country after a fine summer fell season), John Knowles (who won silver in the vets’ race) and under-20 Declan Toomey for the team counters.

While the expected challenge from Rossendale did not materialise, Todmorden (25 points) eclipsed Bolton (51) in the vets’ standings as Simon Dally, Mark Swannell and Chris Povey again battled it out as counters.

Pete Walker finished ahead of Chris Pickford, and Eric Ranicar was second M65.

For the women, u20 Fiona Gande clearly enjoyed the extra distance by improving to 37th and led the seven Blue Vests home.

Karen Hood was again second counter over the 5k distance, with Hannah Edwards bookending the team that netted 144 points for 12th position.

Results – men: team 1st 59pts, Tom Carson 37:38, Tommy Harrison 38:22, Jonothan Kay 38:35, Phil Marsden 39:26, John Knowles 39:35, Declan Toomey 40:08 (U20), Simon Dally 41:02, Mark Swannell 42:27, Chris Povey 42:49, Craig Renshaw 44:19, Peter Walker 46:06, Chris Pickford 47:33, Howard Taylor 48:55, Eric Rannicar 52:35, Anthony Warham 54:29, Stuart Parsonson 55:45, Andrew Hood 56:46.

Women: team 2nd 144pts, Fiona Gande 24:36 (u20), Karen Hood 25:42, Cherry Collison 26:43, Sara Green 27:40, Julie Lomax 27:57, Adrienne Fisher 30:28, Hannah Edwards 31:12.

For the juniors, both u11s teams starred among the large fields of 96 boys and 80 girls.

Harvey Kenny switched his Red Rose Cross Country Leigh result with Oisin Behan to lead the counters and improve to fourth of nine with 34 points.

Izzy Merritt collected individual race silver and was joined by Lily Philbin and Grace Tonge as counters for the team that won gold.

Reduced squad sizes for all other junior teams were perhaps due to the wet weather, though Ruairi Behan (19th out of 56) was able to lead the u13s boys to a counting place.

In the same age-group, despite Anna Quinn (25th out of 68) joining Clemencia Longthorne with creditable outings, another clubmate was needed to form a full team, and Adam Akik was again the only counter for the u15s boys with a fine 11th place.

The Erzan-Essien siblings were separated by only 19 seconds as they led the six u15s girls to bronze with 29 points.

For the u17s, a determined Scott Hood narrowed the gap to Joe Gande and Katie Oakley managed to pull away from Rachel Bailey in the jostle for sixth for the girls.

Mercedes Mercer escaped the last section of quagmire to cross the line ahead of Georgia Greenhalgh and form the second-placed team with 21 points.

Results – U11s boys: team 4th 34pts, Harvey Kenny 8:34, Oisin Behan 8:40, Laurence Britton 9:11, Kevin Longthorne 9:22, Sam Hazelwood 9:34, Henry Worester 10:07, Joshua Bentley-Hughes 10:11, Matthew Wilkinson 10:36, Christopher Fordham 10:43, Finn Coop 11:19.

U11 girls: team 1st 34pts, Isabella Merritt 8:35, Lily Philbin 9:08, Grace Tonge 9:45, Hannah Swales 10:08, Erin Barlow 10:26, Amy Rossington 10:29, Sofia Aftab 11:05, Idowu Taiwo 11:24.

U13 boys: team 8th 83pts, Ruairi Behan 10:57, Ben Pickford 11:19, Joseph Cooper 11:53.

U13 girls: Anna Quinn 12:37, Clemencia Longthorne 14:05.

U15 boys: Adam Akik 17:05.

U15 girls: team 3rd 29pts, Maya Erzan-Essien 18:27, Madeline Erzan-Essien 18:46, Molly Philbin 18:59, Ellie-Jo Ramsden 20:36, Leah Rus.orth 21:26, Ellie Forrest 23:49.

U17 boys: Joe Gande 20:36, Scott Hood 25:42.

U17 girls: team 2nd 21pts, Katie Oakley 23:37, Rachel Bailey 23:44, Mercedes Mercer 24:31, Georgia Greenhalgh 25:58.