LSARRC Press Report 2nd August 2011

Kirsty Fraser made history on Saturday, being the first member of Lytham St Annes Road Runners to represent Lancashire in a track and field meeting. The occasion was the Northern Inter-counties which this year was staged in glorious sunshine at Leigh Sports Village. Somewhat unusually the organisers opted for a 400m race for the under 17 girls rather than the traditional 300m. Despite having never raced this distance previously, the 15 year old Lytham St Annes High School student immediately set about the task of adjusting her training and race schedule.


She was a bit unfortunate to draw the unfavoured outside lane but, unperturbed, she got off to a great start and had moved into second slot by the 200m mark. In the final 100m Kirsty kept her form to finish strongly and cross the line a comfortable second in 61.54 earning eighth place overall. This was an excellent debut, especially considering some of the more experienced competitors are a year older than Kirsty.

The 2011 Firemen's Relay took place on Friday around the 2.8 mile circumference of Heron's Reach Golf Course. Over fifty runners from around seven clubs took part in this sociable race which was followed by hot dogs and tea back at Forest Drive Fire Station.


First Lytham team back of the three that took part was the Top Slots in 5th position and first vet 40 team. These were Willie Richmond on leg 1 (17:30), Roy Upton on leg 2 (17:02) and fastest Lytham runner, Graham Webster on leg 3 (16:14) to finish in 50:46. Next in for Lytham and also prize-winners were the Frisky, Feisty, Females, best female over 40s team in 13th. Fastest was Lucinda Protheroe on the second leg (17:59) with Bec Willetts on third leg (20:28). First leg runner Fiona Geldhard won her first ever prize finishing in 22:03.


Rob Goodall (24:04) joined the older men Mike Hutchinson, MV70 (23:27) and Bill Lock, MV65 (22:16) in the We Remember the 60s team finishing in 16th position. Dawn Lock completed the circuit in 29:12.

On Sunday 128 runners competed in the Cliviger 6 mile road race in Burnley. The fastest for Lytham was Peter Cruse finishing sixth and the second vet. Mel Koth in 44th was the first FV35 while Bec Willetts and Pam Hardman also put in creditable performances to claim 96th and 98th places respectively.


Twenty-five competed in the monthly handicap on Thursday, the largest field for quite some time. Julia Rolfe won by a comfortable margin to confirm she’s now recovering well from injury. Joe Greenwood, Matt Nutt, Lucinda Protheroe and Kevin Ashworth all ran PBs. Kevin moves up to the top of the overall table after this the fourth race of the series.