SHORTLY after the world’s best cyclists battled the monsoon conditions through Ilkley on Sunday, many of the region’s finest fell runners tackled the Rombalds Romp.

There was an Ilkley Harriers one-two as Tom Adams held off Jack Wood around the 8.1-mile circuit, which featured 370 metres of ascent.

The race took in a multi-terrain route from Keighley Road over rough rocky tracks, heathery paths and a forest section - all made more testing by the constant rain.

Adams stopped the clock in 52 minutes and 51 seconds - a time all the more impressive given the conditions - with Wood, who won the Skipton Parkrun the day before, 48 seconds back.

Matt Cox (fifth), Jon Dennis (seventh) and Gavin Lamb (13th) made it five Harriers in the top 15, while Helen Wood was the fifth lady.

The same day, Nathan Edmondson notched another win for Ilkley at the Kirkstall Abbey 7.

Starting and finishing within the spectacular grounds of the Abbey, the event takes used riverside paths and the canal towpath and Edmondson produced a dominant performance.

He was the only runner (out of 351 finishers) to dip under the 40-minutes mark and came home over a minute clear of second-placed Sam Robins (Chapel Allerton Runners).

It was all the more impressive as Edmondson had been in winning form 24 hours earlier at the Woodhouse Moor Parkrun, covering the 5km in 16:13.

It made it four wins for Ilkley in little over 24 hours but perhaps the most impressive Harriers' performances of the weekend came from Hilda Coulsey and Geoff Howard.

Coulsey set an all-time F65 club record marathon time of four hours, 17 minutes and 16 seconds in Berlin, as Kenenisa Bekele just missed out on the world record by two seconds.

There were over 30,000 finishers and Coulsey was 16th in her age category.

Also excelling for the Harriers on the international stage was Howard.

He took part in the 19th World Masters Mountain Running Championships in Leuca in Italy - and won a 75+ gold medal with a time of 42 minutes and five seconds.

That saw him finish a superb 28th overall out of 180 runners, most of whom were younger than him as it also comprised the M60, M65 and M70 championships.

Colin Donnelly (Cambuslang) was the race winner in 33.10 and M60 gold medalist.

The dramatic race was run up a steep, rocky, limestone cliff in sweltering conditions - and then back down again.

Back in Britain, several Harriers tackled events at opposite ends of the distance spectrum.

The Leeds Evensplits is a full-out 5km ‘sprint’ around the Brownlee track in Leeds, and there were personal best times for both Nathan Coy (11th in 17:22) and Mike Abrams-Cohen (31st in 18:51).

Endurance was the name of the game in the ‘Reservoir Dogs’ ultra, which took in seven of the reservoirs which serve the Leeds area.

The extended option of 36 miles was the one chosen by Oli Street and he was 13th of the 94 finishers in a time of 6.56.53.

Results

Rombalds Romp, Sunday

1 52:51 Tom Adams

2 53:39 Jack Wood

5 60:42 Matt Cox

7 62:59 Jon Denniss

13 65:47 Gavin Lamb

31 73:41 Helen wood

32 73:53 Paul Calderbank

64 finished

Parkruns, Saturday

Burnley

(1 16:49 Callum Davidson, Rossendale Harriers)

40 23:56 Will Worboys

216 ran

Conyngham Hall

(1 18:58 John Young, Harrogate Harriers)

22 24:46 Malcolm Pickering

69 31:50 Anna Pickering

99 ran

Highbury Fields

(1 17:16 Rafael Guerrero, U/A)

4 18:15 Oscar Stapleton

361 ran

Rock Creek Trail (USA)

(1 18:30 Chris Cullen, U/A)

13 29:53 Sarah Edwards

23 ran

Royal Tunbridge Wells

(1 18:27 Ben Jones, Worcester AC)

29 22:33 Adam Bennett

291 ran

Skipton

1 16:59 Jack Wood

62 27:00 Bess Sturman

185 ran

Woodhouse Moor

1 16:13 Nathan Edmondson

4 17:50 Steven Gott

444 ran

Leeds Evensplits 5k, Wednesday, September 25

A Race

11 17:22 Nathan Coy (PB)

14 17:34 Dan McKeown

31 18:51 Mike Abrams-Cohen (PB)

48 20:00 Steve Coy

60 20:33 Rob Budding

72 21:39 James Greenlay

82 raced

B race

7 22:39 Harry Sime

57 raced