Beccles and Bungay Harriers had a busy day of events for several of their members on Sunday.

At Thetford the Norfolk contingent competed in the Norfolk Cross Country Championships with some notable success.

In the girls’ under 11 competitions, Amelia Webber lifted the winner’s trophy with an outstanding 1.9K run in a time of 9:13 minutes. She was closely followed by club members Izzy Last (sixth) and Iris Palmer (13th) and together they also gained silver in the team event.

These are very satisfying achievements as all the girls are new to county competition and train extremely hard.

In the girls’ U17s race, Lucy Emmett came fourth in what was an extremely competitive field, whilst her mum, ultra-runner Lynn Emmett, won the senior women (V45-49) race and her grandmother, Judy Potter, was runner-up in the veterans’ 70+ race to make it a successful family affair.

On the same day at Bury St Edmunds a slightly smaller group of runners were taking part in the Suffolk Cross Country Championships which were held in the picturesque grounds of Culford School.

In all five members took part in what was a rather flat course but with a bitingly cold wind on the day. Brooke Oram performed well in the girls’ U15 race, finishing seventh out of a large group of competitors and Cara Howe in the U17 age group also produced a good race, finishing sixth in a high quality age group.

Lauren Howe was the highest placed member, finishing fourth in the senior women’s event. This was a very good effort considering it was her first move up into the senior ranks at 19.

For the men, George Edwards did very well in his first county running event, finished 29th in what is a huge age range of runners (senior men from 20-39 years) and Gary Howe completed the gruelling 12K course to finish sixth in the senior men’s (V60-65).

All in all it was a most satisfying day of running and positions for Beccles & Bungay Harriers AC.

The first parkrun of 2018 at Gorleston attracted a field of 282. First over the line, and by some distance, was Ipswich Jaffa’s Rob Chenery who completed the 5km circuit in 16 minutes 45 seconds. Great Yarmouth Road Runners’ Marc Evans was over a minute behind in second (17.50).