CITY of Salisbury Athletics and Running Club’s young star Bea Wood is now officially the number one ranked under-17 British female runner and fourth fastest in the under-18 ladies European rankings for 2019, writes DI CROSS.

This followed an outstanding result at the Havant open meet in Portsmouth last Saturday.

Running in a 3,000m mixed race, she performed superbly in the sweltering conditions and was never out of the top three.

Wood crossed the line in second place behind a under-17 male in a time of 9:32:4 a new personal best.

“All this in only her second track race at this distance; I was fairly pleased,” beamed her club coach, David Amey.

Proving it is never too late to achieve great things, Ali Theobald (pictured above) took a first in category prize (FV70) in the Koblenz 10k in Germany.

Theobald who completed the course in 58:17, was accompanied by Kate Mansfield, who ran an impressive 1:45 in the Half Marathon.

Several club runners supported the inaugural Winterslow 5k and 10k Trail Run – including Michael O’Connell and Kieran McManus – while club member Kathryn Dreyer donated a running-themed cake, which was raffled.

Further afield, Vicky and Steve Robinson headed to Reigate for the town’s Half Marathon. Steve earned himself a new PB, crossing the line in 1:47:31, just slightly behind Vicky, who finished in 1:45:52.

Also completing a half marathon was Nick Hudson, who took part in Richmond Runfest at Kew Gardens. Hudson finished in 1:35:01, taking seventh place in his age category and crossing the line at the same time as marathon winner Chris Thompson, the 2010 European 10,000m silver medallist. Coming in behind Thompson was City runner Chris Maples, who finished in just under four hours; Grace Cousins – who took five minutes off her previous PB to finish in 4:25 and Paul Thompson, who just missed a sub-five hours spot.