ON Wednesday evening (July 26), eight members of Okehampton Running Club (ORC) and three juniors headed off to take part in the Postbridge Pootle, part of the Dartmoor Fell Series of races, writes Jacqueline Shields.

This popular 10k race was new to the series last year. The senior route was around less visited places with stunning views, however with the rainy conditions sadly these could not be enjoyed on Wednesday. In fact the race had everything a British summertime Dartmoor race could have, wind, rain, poor visibility and bogs along with a great finish next to the clapper bridge – perfect for a post-race dip to wash off the mud!

The juniors ran well with Laurence Hicks and Arthur Lane coming home in joint first place for the U11 males in 5:48.3 and Jacob Lane first in the U9 males in 6:44.4. ORCJ are currently in first place in the team scoring for the series.

The seniors also performed well with Chris Turner the first ORC home in a time of 48:26.6, fourth place overall and third in his age category. He was followed by Tom Poland in 49:11.4 in seventh place, third in his age category, then Rob Hicks 51:41.4 and Joseph Lane 54:27.0.

Claire Watkins was next, the second female in a time of 1:00:42 and first in her age category. She was closely followed by Daniel Heggs 1:01:52, Will Seviour 1:04:02 and Hannah Susorney 1:21:35.

Great running by everyone, especially given the conditions on the evening. ORC is currently first place in the team scoring. The next event in the series is on August 9 at Ivybridge.

On Thursday over 60 runners and marshals turned out to help OCRA with a test run of the long-awaited Okehampton parkrun route. Ian Blythe, race director, was delighted with the response and the success of the route which was tested to the full.

There will be another test run for runners and marshals before the official start of parkrun. For those who are unaware, parkrun is a collection of 5k events for walkers and runners that take place every Saturday morning. As there are currently no other local parkruns to us Okehampton will be filling a large gap on the parkrun map, and as such is eagerly awaited.

If you would like to do parkrun and have not run before or are a little rusty, ORC will be holding their next Couch to 5k training programme starting on Tuesday, September 5.

For more information see our website, www.okehamptonrunningclub.com