HORWICH'S Chris Farrell finished sixth in the final round of this year's British fell racing championships at Merrick Hill near Newton Stewart in Scotland.

Fresh from his exploits with Team GB in Bulgaria, Farrell was followed home by Nick Leigh in 18th.

Danny Hope, fell running again with Horwich this year after several seasons with Pudsey and Bramley and himself a regular England international, described it as a ‘tough old race and lack of training showed for me’ in finishing 25th.

But he was pleased with the RMI turn out which also saw Steve Jackson greatly enhance his V60 competition standing being second home in that category.

James Kevan made a great return from representing Ireland in the Bulgarian mountains to take third in the very competitive English half marathon in Warrington behind the winner, Dejene Gezimu – the Liverpool-based Ethiopian runner – but ahead of nearly 2,200 other runners.

Also on the roads in the Bury 10k James Jordan, who races sparingly, took sixth place in a race of 1,300 runners.

In the Lancaster Castle 10k, Keith Lewthwaite continued the fine run of results from what used to be known as the club’s beginners' group.

He took the V60 category prize to a hearty round of applause from other members of the group who meet every Tuesday and Thursday evening at Horwich Leisure Centre for friendly and enthusiastic running.

Rob Jackson also took first place in the Northern Masters 10k trail race at Edgworth maintaining his run of prize-winning.

For the juniors, the standout performance came from Izzy Merritt in the Wigan Harriers open track meeting where she achieved a personal best by six seconds in winning gold at the under-13 800m race in 2mins 32secs.

Personal bests were also achieved over the 5k distance at Stretford parkrun by Milly Lever, Matthew Flatters and Kieran Kinealy.

Alastair Murray followed up a second place last week in Keswick, by going one better and winning at Haigh Woodland.

Horwich RMI results: Merrick Hill fell race – 6th Chris Farrell 1:20:09, 18th Nick Leigh 1:28:21, 25th Danny Hope 1:30:55, 88th Steve Jackson 1:52:42; Three Shires fell race (Little Langdale) – 74th Dan Gilbert 2:42:39, 126th Albert Sunter 3:05:02, 174th Josie Greenhalgh 3:25:12, 196th Abigail Sunter 3:42:34, 204th David Barnes 4:05:48, 206th Andy Ford 4:15:06; Lancaster Castle 10k road race – 40th Keith Lewthwaite 51:41; Run for all Bury 10k road race – 6th James Jordan – 35:47, 148th Mark Swindell 45:50; English half marathon (Warrington) – 3rd James Kevan 1:09:55; 484th Geoff Leech 1:45:18; Yarrow River Splash 10k trail race – 149th Laura Ryan 1:28:26.