It’s a weekend roundup, but really, this is all about Sunday – Ullswater Lakeland Trails, Hadrian’s Wall Half Marathon, Yorkshire Marathon and NEHL Cross Country. Yes, all of that. Yes, all on the same day.

We’ll start with the annual coach trip to the Lake District; tremendously organised by men’s skipper John Kirby, picking us all up from Rowlands Gill at 8:30am-ish, eh Rachael?!

Fuelled by great craic and diesel fumes, we were on our way – the back seat bad lads and lasses made up of both Hewitson’s, Knox and Ridley… Stopping off en-route at the poshest services Lindsey Dover had ever seen, it even had a cinema, showing the Taylor Swift gig, (at this point we almost lost a Hewitson and a Knox).

We arrived in good time at the finish area to collect numbers – Kirby’s militant time-keeping and register taking skills had not gone to waste. Joining us in Glenridding were the Armstrong’s and Natasha Powell – who’d run there from somewhere (unconfirmed reports it was from home).

We boarded our ferry and prepared ourselves for the cold journey across Ullswater… It soon became apparent we had no need to fear the cold – the live singer who accompanied us on the crossing soon made us forget all about the temperatures on the water. Treating us to a back catalogue of 80’s hits to fit in with the day’s theme of that era.

After clocking up 5000+ steps purely from the toe-tapping and seat-based dancing, we were almost sorry to get off the boat – a number of the group asking if we could maybe sack off the race, get a few beers and head back with him for a bit of a booze cruise…

We lined up at the start, prepared for the off; a mixture of cold, excited, nervous, but most of all ready! The countdown started at 10 and before we knew it, we were off – heading down a little country lane before we hit the real terrain of the race. Lots of hills and lots of trail. Knox, Kirby, Peacock and Hewitson made the early break for the front while the field settled itself down in the first mile or two.

At the front of the pack it was Kirby and Hewitson who were setting the early pace – with a nice group of two others, taking turns to lead and wayfind for the first couple of miles. With precious Grand Prix points of offer, Kirby and Hewitson had been full of the trash talking all morning, but now it was time for business!

Chris would pull away from John and would spend the rest of the race with the mental image of John 2 paces behind him… without knowing it, this pushed Chris into first… not only for DVRC, but the whole race! Getting to the final marshal and hearing him say “you’ve got a good 100 yards lead or so”, Chris assumed this was just of whoever was behind… not of the entire field.

Finishing at the glorious scenery of Glenridding, with the rolling hills all sides was a real privilege to be a part of – the sun shone from start to finish, no worries of waterlogged trails or running down waterfalls. This was the Lakes at it’s absolute best – and wow, did we love it.

With Chris finishing first in 1:14, John was 2 minutes behind in 1:16, in third place. Josh Robson coming out of nowhere to finish 7th overall – proving those Robson genes are as strong as ever! Glen Cooper’s ankle survived to get him round in 1:20 for 9th place, with Bex Hewitson coming in 11th and first female overall, in 1:23. Claire Knox would be the next female in, and second overall, just 10 seconds behind Rob Peacock in 1:27.

Kieran Ridley and Natasha Powell crossed the line together on 1:34 for the 37th and 38th places – with Natasha 9th female overall.

Finishing strongly next and doing the DVRC vest proud was Laura Peacock and Kirsty Robson in 1:39 to sneak inside the top 50 places. With Eleanor Shotton and Neil Frediani bagging themselves a top 100 placing, Lindsey Dover got round and will be very pleased with her sub-2 hour time for our next DVRC finisher, Sue Urwin, Rachael Smith and Sarah Reay following soon after.

Full results can be found here: Lakeland Trails Ullswater 14k

Precious GP points bagged, beers/prosecco/ciders drunk and we were back on our way home – Kirby fearing the mocking, did NOT do a returning register home, much to the disappointment of the, by now, fairly merry, coach trippers. All in all, a brilliant day and one we’re all looking forward to repeating as soon as we possibly can – if you get the chance for a day trip like this, with this bunch of belters, do not turn it down.

Closer to home, was the Hadrian’s Wall half marathon – where we had Deborah Swann and recent recruit Peter Taylor flying the flag for us.

Peter lead us home in 2:32, with Deborah taking that rugged terrain down in 3:02. Great running from both of them, on what was another glorious autumnal day. Full results from that can be found here: Hadrian’s Wall Half Marathon

Also closer to home and ensuring we had members representing the club at the second Cross Country fixture of the season, was Vic Brook, Ellie Binns and Stephanie Edgar, with Sam Spratt flying the lone male flag for us. While Luke Kelly made his u17 debut!

All four of them did us proud with Vic in 112th, Ellie in 218th and Stephanie in 322 – out of 454. Great running from all 3 lasses. With Sam finishing 335 out of 551. Luke finished 13th out of 39 in the boys race. Well done to all five of them! Full results, here: Druridge Bay XC

Heading slightly further south, to the Yorkshire Marathon, we had Will Lacey flying the flag for us, making his marathon debut, no less!

Aiming to get round in 3:45 – Will surpassed his own expectations and finished in 3:39! Huge congrats to Will, no doubt bitten by the marathon bug, will be back to smash that PB now it’s set…

Rewinding back to Saturday morning and ParkRun, to finish off – we had members hitting the courses of Town Moor, Prudhoe Riverside, Whitley Bay, Riverside, Tyne Green and Chopwell Wood. We had Bex Hewitson doing pacing volunteer duties at Tyne Green, while Kirsty and Tony Robson were joined by Chris Morris volunteering at Chopwell Wood. Duncan Marshall hit 25 ParkRuns, too.

Carlsberg don’t do weekends, or running clubs – but if they did – it would be this weekend, and this running club.