On Saturday Okehampton running Club’s most senior member, Jane Richardson, proved that age is no barrier to improving you running. Jane actually didn’t start running until late in life, in fact at the sort of age when many have to stop, but this hasn’t deterred her from improving her times and increasing her distances raced since joining the club and she recently moved up a group in the club sessions. She started running five years ago with Parkruns and is still a prolific participant at these, clocking up her 150th at the Exeter Riverside Parkrun last weekend. As if this milestone wasn’t enough to celebrate, Jane had her best ever run, finishing in 27.29 to set a fantastic new PB and gain her first Platinum award for the distance. This will also be her last run in that age category as when she runs next week she will remarkably be in the 70+ category!
Two Okehampton runners, Carole Cornwall and Katy Speak, paid another visit to the Honiton Hippo on Sunday, having both run it twice before which must say something about their enjoyment of getting muddy and wet! This 7 mile race takes runners along woodland paths, across muddy fields and throws in a couple of river crossings to clean them up. On a bitterly cold and windy day, more in keeping with February than April, the deep muddy ditches and river crossings left the pair of them with numb feet, but the cold conditions may have been a factor in the two ORCs coming home seven minutes faster than last year in 1hr 33min.
