John Gardener retained his British Masters Marathon Championship title with a 13 minute margin over the second placed runner in the Newcastle Town Moor Marathon on Sunday. In the last 12 months, John has won Welsh Masters Gold medals at 400m, 5km , 5 miles, 10 miles, half marathon and marathon, as well as British Golds at half marathon and marathon. John also had the fastest chip time in the Welsh 10km championship, but another runner took the honours with a faster gun time by 4 seconds, which takes priority. John plans to start alongside the Kenyans in future.

The day before, Mark Whitby, Tim Griffiths and David Phillips braved the beautiful, but wild conditions of the Snowdonia Marathon. Dave's race report:

Wild, unforgiving, brutal, stunning and fabulous is why I’ve done this event 26 times now. The multi terrain course takes you through the most fantastic scenery where you are completely against everything the Snowdonia National Park weather can throw at you. Sometimes it’s benign or like yesterday with 60 m.p.h. and fortunately not too much rain (except after the race when by the morning the area was flooded).

 

The start is uphill to the 5 mile mark up Llanberis Pass, then off road on some dodgy rocky tracks then flat road to half way mark at Beddgelert where the real trouble starts with several uphill slogs to Waunfawr at 21 miles. Then the real crippler (manly off road) to the highest point on the top ridge at Bwlch y Groes where the 60 m.p.h. side winds were blowing the runners all over the place. The last mile was almost vertically downhill on grass and rough tracks to the finish in the centre of Llanberis where T shirts and slate mementos awaited us-plus large vociferous crowds.

 

Now many clubs use this as their annual outing and this year was no exception with loads of them there. Fabulous atmosphere and rivalry in the bars all evening.

Dave, who also runs for Massey Ferguson RC, has suggested a match between the two clubs next year, with all of us staying in the Royal Victoria Hotel Friday and Saturday nights. The marathon opens in Jan fills up by Feb/March. Any thoughts?

Meanwhile, Gareth Elliott made his annual trip to the Dublin Marathon, achieving a PB of 3:17:30. Gareth is already planning his next 3 years of marathon and ultra running.

Any literary or photographic contributions to the website will be gratefully received. Laurence :-)