ON Sunday, the annual Hereward Relay was held in very wintry conditions. Five teams from Bungay Black Dog Running Club took part in a race which starts at Peterborough Cathedral and finishes at Ely Cathedral.

ON Sunday, the annual Hereward Relay was held in very wintry conditions. Five teams from Bungay Black Dog Running Club took part in a race which starts at Peterborough Cathedral and finishes at Ely Cathedral.

The course is 38 miles and is usually run in four stages but five runners actually ran the whole course as an “Ultra” runner.

One of these Ultra runners was Bungay Black Dog Ian Taylor who finished second in a time of 5-39:31, and ahead of 21 teams.

The first 10 miles were run in a blizzard but Ian, who trains shirtless all year, was undeterred, and once east of March there was hardly a snowflake to be seen.

The toughest part of the race was the last five miles which included some very long sections of deep mud to test Ian's tired muscles. He was cheered home by some members of his Bungay Black Dog Running Club who had finished their stages. Ian also plans to run in the Hastings Marathon in December which is being staged for the first time since 1908.

Unfortunately on Stage One, Hazel Garrity was stuck on the A1 so missed the start which was 6.1 miles from Peterborough to Whittlesey. First back was Sue Potter in 1-02, then Karen Waters 1-05, Katy James 1-09, David Cook and Hazel Garrity.

Stage Two to March was 11.6 miles and John White and Rob James both had good races to finish in 1-23 and 1-27 respectively. Also in this leg were Bruce Rayner, Philip Neave and Robin Farrar.

Stage Three took in the Welney Wash which had just reopened after flooding for the last few weeks. Due to technical problems times and places are not available but John Wharton, Chris Chorley, Richard Dye, Sally Nicholls and Neil Thomas ran this 10.3-mile stage.

The final stage to Ely was 9.6 miles and Andrew Smith, Bobbie Sauerzapf, Carol Maycock and Bob Jack all finished the run. The fifth runner, Robin Wilson, missed the race due to the weather.

Two of the teams had recorded times. The first team had an aggregate time of 5-16 to finish 63rd and team two finished in 6-1.

On the same day David Punt managed to reach Hadleigh to take part in a very snowy 10-mile race.

Despite the icy conditions over 240 runners took part in the race with David finishing in 1-23:05 in 130th place.