IT WAS the 26th running of the Cotswold Way Relay on Saturday and Thornbury Running Club were aiming to build on past successes in this event with four teams of ten runners competing.

For the past few years, the Veterans team have finished in second place.

Rob Watkins, Vets team captain, was given the pick of the available older men.

Sadly injuries and weddings reduced the pool across the board, but it was a pretty fast selection that wore bib number one on the day for the Vets team.

The overall aim of the race is for teams of ten runners to complete the ten stages of the 102-mile long Cotswold Way from Chipping Camden to Bath Abbey.

The winning team is the squad with the lowest cumulative time.

Putting together the teams and doing pre-race surveying of the routes with the runners required military-like precision by Judy Mills and Mike Bennewitz, who organised Thornbury RC’s effort.

They were also aided on the day by Jim Williams, who was present on most of the stages with extra water and encouragement for the team.

Each stage is a race within a race. Although it is a relay, the stages have mass starts rather than a handover from the previous runner and with 118 Teams taking part in 2018 there was plenty of competition.

Added to the undulating profile of the Cotswold Way, there was the added dimension of the heatwave to contend with this year with the mercury levels rising very high in the afternoon.

The race started in fine drizzle at 7am in Chipping Camden church and Rob Hopkins was the first TRC runner in 61st place.

The stage finish at Stanway House was in sunshine, and by now stage two runners were already on their way with Nick Williams the fastest for the club in team two in an excellent sixth place.

Stage three saw a battered and bruised Sonya Bryson, who took a heavy tumble before getting back on her feet and carrying-on regardless. Paul Thomas was the fastest Thornbury RC runner in 56th place.

On stage four, Henry Orna put in a great performance in 19th place. Jo Emerson perhaps the only runner in the whole event who really enjoyed the extreme heat was sixth female and 51st overall.

Stage five saw the ladies again excelling; Taryn in 22nd place overall and fifth female.

Stage six saw Dylan Roberts in eighth place overall, while on stage seven Rob Watkins put in a captain's performance, sixth finisher and first Veteran.

Also on that stage came Brian Godsman who has only very recently decided he is capable of anything over 5k, nearly 18 minutes ahead of the cut-off time.

Laura Orna took stage eight by storm to finish in 35th place overall and sixth female.

Jim Godden epitomised the team spirit by filling in for an injured runner with one days’ notice on leg nine and was our fastest runner in 38th place.

And so to stage ten where Magda Johnson and Rebecca Dunsford were witnessed singing and dancing their way down the hill to Weston before the run in to Bath. Andy Darton was the fastest in the final leg in 37th place.

The Vets team came a creditable eighth and the faster mixed team two were 12th in that category. The other two mixed teams were 37th and 64th.

There were some parkrun results on Saturday too.

On the Mundy Playing Field’s course in Thornbury Peter Blenkiron ran 26:35 mins, followed by Malcolm Carr 27:23 mins, Karen Carr 27:49 mins, Nigel Hale 29:36 mins and Terry Robinson 44:56 mins.

At Chipping Sodbury Leighton Prescott ran 29:07 mins and in Birkenhead Carol Mosses ran 38:22 mins.