Mercia Fell Runners Club

Despite missing Simon Bailey all our teams ran briiliantly at the Relays this year.  The three teams lined up along with over a hundred other teams in worsening weather, and all ran their hearts out, the B Team and the Vets ran strongly and each runner was cheered wildly as they appeared at the end of their leg.  The Elite team were without their anchor man Simon Bailey who had to pull out through illness,  and the team had to be re shuffled to welcome in Roland Stafford as the first reserve, he ran absolutely magnificently, to his very limit, and finished his leg along with the very best, Pete and Tim W kept up the pace and the partnership of Graham Gristwood/Andi Davies ran unbelievably well to pull a magic 5 minutes up, they finished their leg in the lead and took 'fastest leg' prize and the crowd was going mad!  Tim davies went off like the proverbial 'Bat out of Hell', flew around the course and as he rounded the final hill with a substantial lead the Mercia groupies went into overdrive.  Everyone was over the moon, but soon came a great disappointment there had been a checkpoint missed on the cloud filled hillside, not only us but others too.  Our boys ran so well and they deserved to win, but 'rules is rules' and like the true sportsmen they are, they took it on the chin and walked away to fight another day.