DURSLEY Running Club’s week started with the club Handicap Series on Tuesday evening.

Summer holidays combined with a torrential downpour in Dursley forty minutes before the event started saw a a smaller than normal field of sixty starters for the third race in the series.

Caz Harper-Easthope led the runners home in 34:15mins with Joanne Munyard second just twenty seconds behind and then a gap before the runners came in thick and fast.

Kate Reynolds and Charlie Taylor ran their first handicap. Reynolds finished seventh with Taylor in 11th.

Ben Houghton was first male home in eighth, putting him in a strong position in the series with 21 points.

In the woman’s event, Sarah Miles relinquished her lead to Trish Mansell. Miles was 49 seconds off her best.

Things are pretty tight in the women’s category. Becky Whatling, Kelly Gabb and Lucy Hill are all strongly placed with just under twenty points after two races so the September event will be a real decider, both for the women’s category and the overall series prize.

Nigel Sankey, in 22:19mins, was fastest around, with Matthew Read just 19 seconds slower.

Dave Wood put in a strong run to be third fastest man, eight seconds quicker than Joe Ball. Jadie Cotterell was fastest woman in 25:37mins, ten seconds ahead of Kim Bird, with Fran Amigoni a minute back to be third fastest woman on the night.

Wednesday saw another good evening for Dursley RC at the Bugatti 10k which was the tenth race of 12 in the Gloucestershire AAA Road Race Series.

Mike Brown was first home for the club, 21st overall, in 41:43mins, followed seven minutes later by Dave Saunders and Alice Lewis (second LV55) who finished within a second of each other.

Steve Barnes was next home with Eileen Hieron first FV65 and Karen Eadon doing well in completing a tough ‘undulating’ course with a particularly nasty hill at the finish.

Results: Mike Brown 21st 42:43; David Saundesr 92nd 48:57; Alice Lewis 93rd (2nd FV55), 48:58; Steve Barnes 190th 59:14; Eileen Hieron 223rd (1st FV65+) 01:05:17; Karen Eadon 228th 01:06:21 Saturday’s parkrun saw a Gareth Bradbury post a personal best at Wooton in 19.27mins, sneaking over seventy per cent with his age grading. Joe Ball was first home for DRC at Kingsway and Russell Rolls at Chipping Sodbury.

Personal bests were run by Deborah Moulder, Veronica Higgins, Sarah Newell, Terry Cother and Kelly Gabb all at Kingsway.

The DRC weekend was completed with the Cranham Boundary Chase, the Old Down Country Park 10K and the Standish Woodland Chase.

Paul B Gebbet was Dursley RC’s sole representative at Cranham and completed the challenging 9.8km course in 49:20mins.

At Old Down, Nigel Sankey and Suzanne Moss ran another undulating and technical 10K course.

Sankey came home in tenth in a time of 50:15mins and Moss was 97th in one hour 16:54mins.

At Standish, Kevin Jackson led the DRC team home with Margaret Johnson first Dursley woman home, and the club’s woman’s team of Johnson, Jadie Cotterrell and Jackie Creed joint first.

* At the Cotswold Aquathlon series, Dursley Tri Club’s Rich Pitts made another appearance and Mark Histed led Dursley Tri Club home at the Costwold 113 Tri in five hours 21:45mins.