Published at 11:09, Thursday, 10 May 2012

WEST Cumberland orienteers took gold, silver and bronze at the British Championships last weekend.

The premier ladies team, Helen Winskill, Rosie Watson and Mhairi Mackenzie retained their relay trophy after their 2011 win.

Competition for this trophy is intense with clubs putting their strongest teams out.

Rosie Watson, running second leg had a small deficit to make up at the changeover, and at the second radio control was two minutes in the lead.

Having had a slightly different course from the chasing runners Watson returned to the changeover just 50 metres ahead of the second team.

Mackenzie took over and never looked back, opening up a three minute winning margin.

The M40 team took silver while the W14 (junior ladies) took bronze.

In the individual competition Alastair Thomas had a superb race to take the M12 trophy, and was crowned British Champion.

The individual competition attracted over 1500 runners and raced on some of the best Lake District terrain at Dalegarth in Eskdale.

The open fellside was in perfect condition and gave a first class race with the added bonus of warm sunshine.

The relays were held near Kendal on a limestone escarpment at Helsington.

Steve Birkinshaw, David Spencer and Michael Billinghurst had a very close race to take the silver medal in the M40 class, with Birkinshaw just coming in in the lead after the first lap.

Jenny Bradley, Kate Skinner and Katie Lowles also had a very close race in W14 and with strong consistent running kept in contention to take the bronze medal.

With the championships on home territory WCOC had a great turnout with 19 teams in the relays.

The junior mixed adhoc team, Solomon White, Matthew Whitby and Alex Chaudhri just missed the podium by nine seconds, and came in in fourth place.

Again, a very close finish in the Ladies Short relay gave another fourth placing to Katrina Hemingway, Heather Wornham and Angela Jackson, once again missing the podium by seconds.

More orienteering p38

Published by http://www.whitehavennews.co.uk