Birtley Back in Business at Beamish - report by Lee Drummond

​A great morning for a run as 13 Birtley adult runners headed to Beamish Hall for the socially distanced start of the Beamish trail 10k. Great to see some familiar faces. It seems ages since we all trained and ran cross countries together.

Before the 10k was the kids 2k race, where Birtley were represented by 3 young runners. 3 of the Birtley youngsters finishing in the top 4. Noah Williamson winning, followed in 3rd by Ben Storey 3 seconds ahead of his sister Lexi. Well done all of you, the future is bright.

After a little bit of catching up, us adults headed to the pens for our socially distanced starts. The course began with a lap of the grounds, through the high ropes, through Beamish Wild and for some through the parked cars!!!! Once into the woods we ploughed through plenty of mud, puddles and began to tackle the hills of a lovely scenic course. Not too dissimilar to a cross country venue. A few large undulating loops of the woods and we headed back to the finish line in the grounds of Beamish Hall. A woolly hat, bacon sandwich and hot cuppa waited for us on the other side of the finish line.

Special mention to Lisa Short winning her age category and second female overall. Nigel Simpson also getting an 8th place finish. Well done both.

Also, a mention needs to go to 4 runners who came through the C25K group. 3 of the 4 running their first ever 10k. None of them stopped either!! Really pleased for you all, well done.
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The overall victory however was seeing our club runners all back together, in their vests on the start line. It was also nice to see the other club runners from various North East clubs who we have battled with through various fields of mud. Hopefully we will get back to those days soon.

Lee's idea of a "flatish" course...