Junior Horwich Harriers had an excellent weekend at the Greater Manchester Championships, in Bury.

Lily Mort and Sarah Lawman ran the Under-13 girls’ 75 metres with Lily getting through to the final, but Sarah just missing out. In the final, Lily finished fifth after having just finished fourth in the long jump with 3.93m. Sarah ran a personal-best time in the 150m heats and finished fifth with another PB in the 150m final.

In the U15s, Amelia Green had an excellent day qualifying for both the 100m and 200m finals with PBs in both heats and both finals, but just missing out on a medal in the 200m. Joel Temitayo and Archie Parker competed in the U15 100m and 200m heats, and Joel qualified for the finals with Archie getting a PB in the 100m heats. Joel went on to win both the 100m and 200m to became county champion with automatic selection for the Inter Counties later this month.

At the Lancashire Championships, U20 Jayden Riley finished second in the 100m final, running a fine time of 11.3secs. Jack Fletcher ran a good race in the U15 boys, finishing in third with a PB 14.40 in the 80m hurdles final. Grace Freary also finished third in the U13 girls. 1200m with a time of 4:12.38 In the 1500m, U17 Harrison Stokes comfortably won in 4:04.03, knocking seconds off his PB. This was followed by U17 Ben Topham winning the 1500m steeplechase in 4:51.72 and U20 Benjamin Hall winning the 2,000m steeplechase with a season-best time of 6:19.76.

Elsewhere, a good contingent of Harriers overcame the heat to shine at the fourth race of the Race the Moors Series - the Cake Race- in Dingle.

The course on flagged paths, tracks and trails is a long 10-miler with 1,700 feet of ascent that takes in open moorland scenery, reservoirs, and industrial heritage with the challenge of going over the Pennines and back.

Runners are also reminded not forget to bring along their home-made cakes for the Cake Competition, with prizes up for grabs for best-tasting and decorated.

The Harriers, in the haste for cake at the finish, produced a great set of results with Matt Fawthrop fourth overall. Sandra Kelly, who was first in the W55 age category, claimed bragging rights over husband Nick, who finished as second M55. Doug Fleming took first M60 ahead of team-mate Gary Chadderton in third. The women’s team were second and the men’s were third overall.

In parkrun, taking a nice breather and jog around Bolton following his international racing, Gareth Webb was 158th in a leisurely 33:09 time. In a large field of 525 runners Steve Thomasson managed to avoid any treacherous puddle holes, completing the course in 55th overall with a commendable time of 23:09.

At Pennington, Lesley Davidson and Lynn Smith ran a closely-fought inter-club battle with a mere two seconds splitting the pair. Davidson was 151st (48:08) followed by Smith in 152nd (48:10).

The evergreen Rob Jackson was 10th in 18:36 to claim another first V55 at Peel Park, a feat matched by Tony Hesketh as first V75 in 27:41.

The Middleton’s parkrun tour continued at Clarence with Jason finishing in 72nd (30:13) and Janet sneaking in the top 100 at 97th (37:97), while Storey Fields saw Isaac Park run an excellent 19:42 in a healthy 47th from a field of 447 runners.

At Haigh Hall, Julie Williamson and the ever-present Gillian Smith competed - Williamson finishing 159th (32:01) and Smith 199th (35:10).

Further afield, Brendan Bolland was 95th (25:25) at Keswick, while Sean McTyler and Maria Lowe took on the popular and notoriously fast Stretford course. McMyler was 49th (20:44) and Lowe 70th (21:44) in a congested field of 657 runners.

Quickest run of last weekend went to Robert Seddon’s fourth placing (17:48) at the almost equally busy Endcliffe, which can field extremely large numbers of participants.