We’ve 100 reasons why this is an interesting roundup… If you need to know why, ask Natasha Powell and Stuart Reay. Our daring duo were taking on the 7 Valleys Ultra, in and around the Lake District National Park.

Yes, you read that right – 100km, around the Lake District. This is what the pair of them spent their weekend doing.

Starting in Keswick at 6am on Saturday morning, the pair of them battled all 4 seasons, as is the norm for Lakes, regardless of what time of year you visit. Eventually finishing in the early hours of Sunday morning just before 4am.

We caught up with Natasha to get some words, exclusively for derwentvalleyrunningclub.co.uk:

“Thank you everyone for your supportive messages over the past few days. Stuart Reay and I completed our first run over 100k and wow did we pick a tough one! Conditions on the day meant that the route had to be changed during the race due to strong gales and the whole day was just very wet. Stuart finished in 78th place in 21:17:08 and I finished in 85th place in 21.38.13“

“My longest run to date and my first over 100km. Over the moon with how I did and even though conditions on the day were tough I had a fantastic time. One too many slips on the wet ground caused some knee pain which got progressively worse particularly on the downhills and wet feet led to blisters which by the end felt like I was walking on glass. It was great to see my mam and Aaron at the various checkpoints and all of the marshalls were brilliant, particularly those at Glenridding and Threlkeld. Thank you to everyone who messaged and tracked me throughout the event, it didn’t go unnoticed. I just need to decide where to sew my new patch!”

We certainly have our own definitions of ‘fun’ here at DVRC! Madness!

Also heading out to the Lakes was our matchy-matchy fave Claire Thompson, along with Alan Vicarage – to tackle the 2 Valleys event.

The two of them took down the distance and elevation in less than 3 hours – Alan was 84th in his class, with Claire 59th in her class. Brilliant work!

Also hitting crazy distances and elevation was Jenny Yeo taking on the Pathfinder 25, in North Yorkshire.

Not only did Jenny finish it – but she was the first female home! Amazing work!

Those of us who prefer our Saturday mornings slightly shorter, were at ParkRun for the usual 9am 5k. This week our members were taking on the courses of: Whitley Bay, Rising Sun, Marshall Drive, Volksgarten and of course, Chopwell Wood. Our Kirsty Robson donned the run director bib, ably assisted by Kieran Ridley and Sue Urwin.

Down the coast at Saltburn, there was another Hewitson double as Chris finished 1st at Marshall Drive, with Bex finishing as first female.

Sunday brought news of one of our newest members taking on the Trail Outlaws Penshaw 10k, as Rebecca Campbell claimed her first bit of bling in the white and red DVRC vest.

We’re sure it’s going to the first of many for Rebecca, who happily reported afterwards, “The sessions with DVRC are definitely helping”

Rounding off the weekend, of course, was the Sunday Social gang – taking on the full 15km trail loop of Chopwell Woods.