Morpeth's flying Finn is 5k winner at Sunderland

Finn Brodie on his way to winning the Sunderland 5k.

The two lap race round the fishing lakes also incorporated the Northern Athletics 5k Championships and attracted a strong field of over 200 finishers.

Setting out his stall from the off, Morpeth Harrier Brodie went straight to the front on the downhill charge to the first corner, and was chased only by Carl Smith, now of North Shields Polytechnic Harriers, and club colleague Matthew Briggs.

With Briggs a little race rusty, especially over shorter distances, Brodie had established a lead of several seconds over Smith at the end of the first lap, and was able to extend this to some ten seconds at the end, with a winning time of 14 minutes 41 seconds to Smith’s 14:51.

Briggs meanwhile paid for his efforts to go with the pace, with O40 Jarlath McKenna of Bristol and West coming in 3rd in a time of 14:56.

Connor Marshall, in his first ever road 5k, finished strongly to come in 5th in 15:12 with Matty Briggs dropping to 10th (15:23). With three finishers in the top ten, Morpeth were a clear winner of the team prize.

Richard Johnson ran well to come in 17th in 15:27, and Adam Pratt got under the sixteen minute mark also, 27th in 15:55. Johnson, Briggs and Marshall all recorded new personal bests.

Mark Snowball was 50th in 16:39 and Graeme Thorpe 114th and 25th Over 40 in 17:51. O/65 Dave Nicholson had an excellent run to finish in 19:19, and with prizes in ten year age categories, was still a winner of the O/60 award.

The earlier run women’s race saw Molly Pace of NSP win in 17:49 with club colleague and triathlete Stephanie Maclean-Dann 2nd in 18:17. Tyne Bridge O/50 Kathryn Stevenson was 3rd in 18:29.

Morpeth’s sole representative in the race was Sarah Lawson, running strongly to record a new pb of 19:37 in 15th place.

Sundayt’s Northumberland Coastal Run, between Beadnell and Alnmouth, was won by Jarlath Mckenna in a time of 1:23:05.

Richard Johnson of Morpeth had a fine race to come in 3rd in 1:27:37, with Ross Floyd 11th in 1:35:30 and Alistair Douglas ran 1:42:01 in 29th place.