Commonwealth Championship Up and Down Open Race –Sunday 20th September

Bathed in bright sunshine, amongst the pleasant surrounds of Fitz Park in Keswick this morning a good field toed the line for the 8m/2700’ course of the Up and Down Mountain Race. The race was one of several open races offered over three days as part of the ‘Festival of Running’ that was organised under the umbrella of the Commonwealth Championship. The Up and Down race began in the park, and via Briar Rigg and Spoony Green Lane, took in three ‘undulating’ laps over Latrigg before returning to the park, and the finish...

...The fully flagged course was exactly the same as that tackled by the elite athletes later in the day in the Commonwealth Championship Races. Photographs by Pete Richards from the four days of the Commonwealth Championships can be found at www.keswick-ac.org.uk in the news section.

The open race was won by Prasad Prasad of Clydesdale Harriers in 51:04 who made amends for his run last month in the commonwealth trial race that was run over the same course when he recorded a DNF. First woman was Emma Clayton (Scunthorpe & Dist) in 59:39.

Today’s race was the final race in the Keswick AC club fell-championship 2009. For the men, Phil Winskill made his first appearance in the competition in style with a run of 54:29, 5th place overall to claim maximum points ahead of Steve Hebblethwaite -55:50 (6th), Ian Davies -1:02:28 (24th), Toby Cushion -1:02:43 (25th), Rob Wynne -1:04:14 (29th), Dave Owens -1:08:52 (41st), Quentin Merrit -1:08:56 (42nd), Andrew Murray -1:10:59 (47th), Keith Loan -1:11:25 (49th), Chris Clark -1:18:37 (61st), and Patric Gilchrist -1:21:54 (1st MV60/68th).

For the women, Jo Gillyon raced a good 1:13:18 (8th) ahead of Trudy Beetham -1:16:21 (11th), Debbie Edgington -1:19:16 (13th), Kim Clark -1:20:15 (2nd LV50/14th) and Maureen Bridge ( 1st LV60/16th).

picture: Pete Richards