Fife Athletic Club: Ben’s 10 out of 10 display in top Manchester race

Sandilands and his clubmates – coached by Steve Doig – produced some promising early season performances including a couple of PBs.

Other results were: 800m SW Race 2, 5th Sarah Coutts 2:15.28; 1500m Race 2, 5th Owen Miller 3:53.05, 6th Andrew Thomson 3:53.40; 1500m Race 3, 5th Reiss Marshall 3:57.03; 1500m Race 5, 2nd Alistair Gudgin 4:06.66; 3000m Race 2, 7th Sam Fernando 9:16.01.

Moving onto Saturday, Fife AC youngster Holly Ovens ran a PB of 2:12.91 to finish second in the 800m under-17 women's race at a Parliament Hill track event at Highgate which was screened live on BBC.

And clubmates Hilary Ritchie and Eleanor Smith were age category winners at that day’s Goatfell Hill Race. Ritchie finished as first female 60 and Smith was third female 40.

This race was the second counter in the 2023 Scottish Hill Racing Championships, as well as being a Scottish Athletics Hill Running Championship event. Fife AC results were: 130th Eleanor Smith 1:56:10 (3rd F40), 156th Hilary Ritchie 2:02:30 (2nd F60), 223rd Moira Grainger 2:36:52.

Venturing to Plean for an undulating trail parkrun was Fife AC’s Ryan Campbell-Hodge, who finished eighth in 22:50.

The previous evening, Kirkcaldy Wizards runner Stuart Goodfellow recorded a time of 41:23 to come 73rd at an event raising funds for the local RNLI at South Queensferry.

Top home performers at Kirkcaldy Parkrun were: 1st Glenn Barclay 17:43 (PB), 2nd Rolf Gunnemann 18:02, 8th Andy Harley 20:10, 39 Graeme Syme 24:02, 59th Shona Ross 25:11, 61st Paul Sutherland 25:19, 64th John Kinninmonth 25:38, 70th Eleanor Murray 26:11, 72nd David Shepherd 26:22, 77th Iona Penman 26:29, 80th Judith Arnstein 26:43, 86th Keith Traill 27:18, 87th Craig MacDonald 27:19, 95th Kevin O'Neill 28:05, 101st Nicky Sutherland 29:03, 104th George MacDonald 29:24, 105th Brian Adams 29:32, 112th Kerry McGregor 30:05 (PB), 113th Dana McGregor 30:07.

Ben Kinninmoth was seventh at Edinburgh Parkrun in a PB of 16:51, ahead of ninth-placed Kevin Wallace in a PB of 17:07.

Paul Michael Harkins ended 13th at Blackpool Parkrun in 22:00, while at Bressay Parkrun, Mark Gowans finished 19th in 26:01.

In 31st position at Crichton Parkrun was Selina Skivington in 25:31, while Chris Payne ended 36th at Drumchapel Parkrun in 31:04.

Leading lights at Lochore Meadows Parkrun were: 37th Nick Brian 25:52, 49th Kirsty Dewar 27:23, 63rd Rona Inglis 28:58 and 74th Gillian Notman 30:11.

Kerry Gibson was the sole Fife AC competitor at the Kinoull Hill Race on Thursday, finishing 5th female in 35:32.

Finally, James Hall and Martin Mackay travelled down to Manchester to participate in the Great Manchester Run Half Marathon and 10k events.

Mackay completed the half marathon event in 1:57:00, while Hall finished the 10km competition in 38:13.