CHERRY Fowler and Sue Shergold swapped the Forest of Dean for the New Forest as they put in strong marathon performances.

The mixed terrain New Forest Marathon saw Cherry finish first out of 81 runners in the F40 class with a fast time of three hours 30 minutes and 25seconds, with Forest of Dean AC club mate Sue in fourth in the F50 class in 3.49.16.

Five FODAC runners also followed Sir Mo Farah home in the Great North Run half-marathon between Newcastle and South Shields the same day, Saturday, September 10.

Richard Peglar finished in 1.35.03 with Simon Roberts just one second behind in 1.35.04, while Vanessa Peglar achieved a half-marathon PB with a time of 1.56.35 with Karen Barnett finishing in 2.00.31 and Lisa Adams in 2.11.00

The club’s Autumn Mile saw 72 runners from five different clubs competing on Tuesday evening, September 12, at the Five Acres track, with strong winds and driving rain making for dramatic and challenging conditions.

Pete Woodward was the fastest runner of the day and the only runner under five minutes with a time of 4.58, with Marcus Bennetto second in 5.07 and Martyn Winser of Chepstow Harriers third in 5.09.

Of the first three women, Chloe Wheeler and Samantha Harris managed to squeeze in under six minutes with times of 5.57 and 5.58 respectively. while Chepstow Harriers runner Nicki Morgan finished in 6.18.

In a fortuitous turn of events, this also saw Chloe finish as first Senior Woman with Samantha first in the F40 class and Nicki first in the F50 class.

In Nicki’s, case this meant not only winning her own age group, but finishing ahead of a further 12 women in younger age groups as well.

The first three finishers in each age group were: Senior Men - Pete Woodward 4.58, Marcus Bennetto 5.07, Martyn Winser 5.09; Senior Women - Chloe Wheeler 5.57, Danielle Sapsford 6.31, Emma King 6.56; M40 - Peter Ward 5.18, Austin Blackburn 5.40, Dan Sandford 5.43; F40 - Samantha Harris 5.58, Lisa Jeffrey 6.26 and Debbie Stenner 6.39; M50 - Paul Dodd 5.42, Walter Leach 5.50, Richard Dennant 6.19; F50 - Nicki Morgan 6.18, Rachael Wheeler 6.55, Angela Sonn 9.38; M60 - Steve Owen 6.20, Neil Grant 6.30 Alan Robertson 6.49; F60 - Joyce (Joc) Dodd 8.14, Sue Ashton 8.49;

M70 - Geoffrey Baylis 8.24, Geoffrey Cram 9.02, Syd Wheeler 9.55.

Meanwhile, hundreds of runners will be turning out for the Forest of Dean Autumn Half Marathon this Sunday (September 24) on its traditional trails course.

Organised by the Royal FoD Rotary Club and supported by the Forestry Commission, the race starts (10am) and finishes at the Speech House. There are a limited number of places still available via the online registration page, but will only be available until 6pm on Friday, September 22.