Honours of the week must cascade on the shoulders of Nick Jones for his outstanding achievement of running 83.3 miles in an astonishing 23 hours and 35 minutes at the TransGranCanaria ultra event over in Maspalomas, Gran Canaria. Described as “the mother of all races”, and aimed at ultra-endurance race extremists, the course must be completed on foot in less than 30 hours, so Jones was well within the time limit. With almost 21,000 feet of climbing over mountainous rocky terrain, his achievement is all the more impressive.

The beautiful Capability Brown landscaped parkland at Harewood House, near Leeds, was the venue for the annual English National Cross Country Championships last weekend. Attracting the cream of the country’s runners, Buxton AC athletes took the opportunity to run alongside some of the big names in the sport. Seven of the Club’s females took part in the 8K race and can be rightly proud of their performances. First home for the ladies was the talented Amy Clark, finishing in a very creditable 136 from a field of over 1,000, and in a time of 34 minutes and a second. Kate Ledin finished second for the team in 40.29, Ruth Gowers in 43.39, Elizabeth Nocton in 47.00, Rachel Dowle 47.25, Heather Fryer-Winder 48.35 and Sarah Soles 53.05.

Over a two lap 12K course, taking in a few more hills than the undulating ladies’ course, the men had their work cut out competing in a huge field of over two thousand runners, a sight to behold as the starting gun went off. Rob White ran a strong race to finish in 426^th place in 44.00, followed by Dan Latham 51.43, Dave Soles 52.42, Andy Lidstone 53.06, Stefan Ledin 57.47 and Pete Bailey 63.06.

Held out of Glossop, Doctor’s Gate fell race covers 11.2 miles and 3,000 feet of climbing, and traverses moorland tracks, stream crossings, steep valleys, peat bogs and rocky ascents. This didn’t faze Dan Latham or Martin Ward recently, who performed admirably to finish in 2 hours 7 minutes and 17 seconds (Latham, 17^th) and 2.44.01 (Ward, 65^th) from a field of 103. Helen Thornhill, a Buxton AC member until leaving for university and now running for Ribble Valley, was first female overall in 2.01.19.

Parkrun round-up includes a couple of Target 5K graduates at the Lyme Park event. Aaron Leah and Eleanora Petrelli were first timers, completing the hilly course in 32.40 and 33.16 respectively. Mark Thorogood was 33^rd from a field of 151 in 25.36, Tim Rolfe 67^th in 28.51. At Bakewell, Jane Poulter finished the course in 29 minutes, whilst Tracy Gregory not only ran at the Marple Parkrun on Saturday, finishing in 28.58, but took part in the Race On Track Half Marathon at Oulton Park the following day in a personal best time of 2.02.57, and 1^st Female Vet 50 to boot. Neil Evans ran at Glossop, finishing 34^th from 115 runners, in 24.15.