Top-three place for marvellous Marlow in challenging half marathon

He led the race for the first four miles, and held off some strong challenges from behind to hang on to third place with a time of 01:29:31 – less than a week after nearly slicing his thumb off in a hedge-cutting accident.

Jamie said the race had a strong field, with runners from all over the south-east, and the course was hilly and muddy with patches of soft sand – and great views, although he was mostly “working too hard to look up”.

Meanwhile, Jamie’s team-mate Duncan Hamilton ran the Stort30, a 30-mile ultra off-road marathon near Bishop’s Stortford.

Duncan, a rising ultra-marathon specialist, finished ninth overall out of nearly 250 runners, with a time of 03:57:44 – achieving his goal of breaking the four-hour mark.

In other news, 10 club members took on the Ricky Road Run in and around Rickmansworth.

The top four in the group finished within a minute of each other, with Steve Shaw the first to cross the line, inside the top 40 and second VM50 with a time of 01:09:06.

Hot on his heels were Chris Kitchener, Steve Russell and Russell Morris, finishing within the next minute.

After them came twin sisters Becky and Sam Fawcett, who finished in a time of 01:17:39.

Next up was Rob Deane, who scored a new PB of 01:25:55, and he was followed by Jessica Tanner, Michelle Ashwell and Kirsty Russell.

Also in action was Samantha Hawkridge, who travelled to the Olympic rowing venue at Dornely Lake to complete the Synthetix Run for the Homeless 10k race.