FIVE Black Dogs ran the third leg of the Friday Five series at Kirton last Friday. The weather was perfect for an evening run and all 427 runners enjoyed the scenic rural course.

FIVE Black Dogs ran the third leg of the Friday Five series at Kirton last Friday. The weather was perfect for an evening run and all 427 runners enjoyed the scenic rural course.

First Bungay runner was Robbie James, 33:57 in 97th place, with Andy Prime next in 37:50 (202nd) with Bobbie Sauerzapf just behind in 38:31 (220nd).

Neil Thomas had a good run to break the 40-minute mark, finishing in 39:07 (238th) with David Potter very pleased with knocking a full two minutes off his Ipswich time to finish in 385th place in a time of 46.59 minutes.

The younger members of the James family ran the two-mile fun run, but times were not recorded officially.

Bungay Black Dog runner Ian Taylor had a busy time in Sussex recently when he entered three races in one week.

Near Chichester, on June 8, he finished seventh out of 104 in the Fishbourne Flat Five Mile cross country in a time of 34:02. There were numerous stiles, gates, bridges, muddy tracks and narrow footpaths to negotiate in 20C.

Cooler temperatures on Thursday evening for the third race in the Hove Park Summer 5k Series produced another fine result for Taylor when he finished third out of about 50 runners in 18:50.

Worthy of diamond standard, this represented a 17-second improvement over his May attempt. It also placed him one position higher in the results.

The Seaford 10k, run almost entirely off-road on Sunday contained the hardest climb he has encountered in any race so far. A hill known as “High and Over” involved runners ascending to a height of 100m within a distance of just 350m, taking almost five minutes.

Taylor's finishing time of 43:22 which earned him 15th place out of 143 finishers.

Three Black Dogs took part in the Wymondham Hethel Engineering 10-mile race on Sunday.

The sultry conditions were found trying by many of the 140 finishers.

The course around the scenic country lanes was well marshalled, and for Bungay Richard Dye finished in 1-13:04 in 52nd position with Bobbie Sauerzapf taking the honours as first female V45 runner to finish in a very good time of 1-21:54 in 95th place.

Despite the heat V65 runner, Robin Farrar finished strongly to record a time of 1-26:32 minutes in 115th place.