Three Buxton Juniors made the 240 mile round trip up to Guisborough Woods, North Yorkshire for the 4th round of the FRA English Junior Fell Running Championships. Will Longden, who recently won the U19 British Intercounties last weekend in Kettlewell, carried on his winning streak finishing 1st overall, post race he exclaimed: ‘ I think running after my Clun Forest sheep the day before the race didn’t affect my legs at all!’

Will was  closely followed by little sister Grace Longden in the U17s, where she finished 2nd overall. Connie Jenneson also made the long trip up to the race to finish 6th U17 – another amazing result after Connie, Grace and Lucy Whelan represented their schools in the Derbyshire Schools Track and Field Cup on Wednesday 18th May.

Closer to home, lots of juniors took part in the Hayfield Fell Races which happened over the weekend. The first race of the weekend was on Friday night – Hayfield May Queen Fell Race. This race is a tough 3 mile course which was dominated by Buxton Juniors. The race was won by Buxton Junior coach Lucas Parker. Stu Diamond showed good form as he moves into the senior ranks finishing 4th overall. In 12th place and 2nd U17 male was Jake O’Donnell. Amy Whelan ran an excellent race to win the ladies and U19 girls.

Next Buxton runner to finish was Rachel Cudahy taking 3rd female and 1st U13 girl. Rachel was also awarded the Charlie Craig trophy for her spirit in fell racing. Meanwhile Rebecca Cudahy was 1st U15 girl with teammate Lucy Whelan taking 2nd place. The success continued on Sunday where many junior’s took part in the Lantern Pike Dash. This race is a short but extremely steep route. In the senior race Caleb Winfield finished 2nd with Amy Whelan taking her second win of the weekend finishing 1st lady overall! Lucy Whelan finished 31st overall. Hot on Lucy’s heels was Rebecca Cudahy in 32nd.
It was quite an eventful time for the junior race. This was due to a missing marshal, resulting in the whole field of runners disappearing off through some woods towards Glossop and then reappearing before taking a multitude of routes back to the finish! Amy Whelan helped save the day by, (after just winning her race) setting off up the hill to retrieve the lost juniors. Three year olds were beating 12 year olds so positions were mixed up but Buxton Juniors Bea Forrest, Dulcie Forrest, Verity Dawson, Teddy Morgan, Charles Stott, Oliver Ball, Daniel Preston, Rachel Cudahy and Hannah Cudahy all took part. All the juniors were very pleased that there was chocolate at the end!