Successful weekend for Morpeth Harriers at English Road Running relays, Kielder Marathon Weekend and Run Through Jarrow

Another strong performance from the club’s Senior Men in the ERRA Road Relays saw them claim an outstanding top 10 finish over the six challenging stages.

Finn Brodie led out, clocking 17 minutes 21 seconds for the 5.84k leg and coming back in 11th place.

Carl Avery moved the team up to fourth after running one second faster.

On the third leg, George Lowry’s 18:21 put the team ninth, but Josh Fiddaman (17:47) moved up two places on leg four and Phil Winkler, recording the same time on leg five, moved up a further two to fifth.

Drafted in at relatively short notice and still not fully race fit, Sam Hancox’s 18:47 on the last leg saw the club finish eighth out of 67 teams with an overall time of 1:47:23.

Closer to home, the west of the county welcomed several thousand competitors for the Kielder Marathon Weekend.

The 10k race saw a double Morpeth victory, with Amble-based Over-40 veteran Ian Harding taking the title in 33 minutes 51 seconds, while club colleague Cat Macdonald was first woman and 10th overall, recording 38:39.

Dave Stabler also made the top 10, finishing in eighth in 37:03, while Jane Kirby was first O/50 in 46:14 and Jamie Johnson first male O/50 in 41:46.

Andrew Hebden finished in 13th for Morpeth in 1:25:41 in Sunday’s half marathon, while Lorna Macdonald was third female finisher in 1:34:03.

Morpeth’s Jane Hodgson was over five minutes ahead of the next female finisher as she came home in 10th place overall to win the women’s marathon in 3:16:05.

Anna Wright was third O/40 and 27th overall in 3:31:44 and Jane Briggs 233rd and sixth O/50 in 4:23:35.

Sunday morning also witnessed nearly 1,000 runners taking to the streets around Jarrow and Hebburn for the Run Through Jarrow 10k.

Morpeth’s Alex Brown was third (30:49) in the A race.

Connor Marshall was eighth in 31:55, Kirsty Burville, first O/40 in 40:48 and James Dixon, 52nd in 36:37.