Kibworth & Weston 5

Chris keeps up the pressure & a prize for Nikki!
Kibworth was the location for the third race in this year’s Leicestershire Road Running League with the 6 mile course arguably the most challenging of the series. It was Chris Pearson who was first back of the 21 competitors from the Club who lined up on the start line with 508 other runners.  Chris’s 35.48 chip time and a superb 22^nd place finish confirmed his place as the frontrunner in the Club’s 2015 Club Championship. Current Club Champion, Dominic Sharman made his first Championship appearance of the season, and he had a titanic battle with Andy Hawtin just edging it by 2 seconds & one place in times of 36.14 & 36.16 & 31^st & 32^nd places respectively. Jack Leafe scored excellent team points with his 37.00 & 42^nd place before Christina Cooper continued her excellent start to the year with a superb 3^rd place finish in the women’s race in a time of 39.40. Andy Orme relished the challenging course to record 40.42 edging out league rival Steve Leafe’s 41.41 and a resurgent Gavin Horton, who ran well for his 42.20. Mark Coombes, showed no ill effects from his recent ultra-distance run and ran superbly for his 43.19 with Tom Eyre, gaining more valuable race experience, as he crossed the line next in 44.49. Tracey Glover & Kelly Knight continued their healthy inter-club rivalry with Tracey’s 45.13 and 26^th place too good on this occasion for Kelly’s 45.55 & 30^th place. While Mitchell Timms was next across the line his chip time of 46.37 was slightly slower than the hard working Paul Glover’s 46.31 who finished behind Mitchell ‘gun to tape’. Ian Barsby ran well for his 48.29 with Mark Nixon, continuing his return to competitive racing after a long time out with injury, stopping the clock in 49.58. Tim Argent battled well up the steep climbs to record 50.59 as did Richard Ward, whose 53.21 was good enough to retain top position in his league. Chris Morton, making his first competitive start of the season, ran well for his 53.48 as did Inge Moore who completed the finishers for the Club in 69.23.
Simon Reynolds & Nikki Reeves made the shorter journey to run the Weston 5 on Sunday. According to Nikki it was a nice course, although the windy conditions meant it wasn’t as easy as it could have been.  Nikki set off too quickly as usual & was watching Simon’s orange calf guards for quite some time & felt comfortable.  The wind was almost head on in the second half of the race & Nikki spent the rest of race looking for a tall stocky guy to run past that she could ‘use and abuse’ as a windbreak.  There was good support at the Ukrainian Centre where race headquarters were based. Even without a windbreak Nikki was 4th lady, 1st in age cat, 62nd overall  and smashed her PB for the distance with a time of 35:59. Simon, orange calf guards & all was an excellent 28th overall in a time of 33:26