'God's in his heaven, All's right with the world!' summarised the prevailing mood in the Skyrac team car as they drove up the M6 after the Fell and Hill Running Championship at Church Stretton in Shropshire last Saturday.

Solid performances by every member of the team were enhanced by the excellence of Steve Batley and Andy Brear on the specialist navigation leg where runners are only handed information relating to the checkpoints after they start the leg and poor navigation can result in a quarter of the field passing you.

As Steve and Andy are tutors on the Navigational Skills Course run by Skyrac for the FRA a superb leg was expected and delivered.

Helped by a brilliant performance by Gary Devine and Jason Hemsley on the navigation leg the surprise overall winners were Pudsey and Bramley who on 3.38.36 were 23 seconds ahead of the local Mercia team who organised the event.

Running on local terrain is always advantageous but there are few fells in Salford so the third place achieved by Salford Harriers was an excellent performance illustrating that on the firm Long Mynd tracks pure speed counts.

The Skyrac Vets team of Duncan Asquith, Martin Farrar/Bob Pritchard, Steve Batley/Andy Brear and Graham Breeze finished in 4.46.16, 12th of 23 Vets teams and were 46th overall beating 40 other teams.

In 2002 a calamitous day had produced Skyrac's worst ever Relay Championship so the cheery mood on the way home was one of normal service being restored.

Skyrac can be contacted via 0113 229 0924 or www.skyrac org.uk

Orienteering Success

Runners from all over the north of England went to Marsden Moor, south of Huddersfield, to compete in a regional orienteering event. Events are arranged in age-group categories and runners from Airienteers - the orienteering club for Leeds and Bradford - were victorious in several races, most of which involved significant climb across complex moorland with few paths or other line features. These were :

M35 (8.7km) - Neil Conway 63.12 mins; W21 (7.6km) - Sarah Haines 76.08 mins; JW5 (6.2km) - Victoria Stevens 68.43 mins; JM4 (4.1km) - George Stevens 39.33 mins; JW2 (1.9km) - Florence Haines 13.01 mins; JM5 (7.6km) - Ben Stevens 74.27 mins.

Junior runners from Airienteers were out in force, and other good results were recorded by Chris Brook, Daniel Holmes, Hector Haines, Joe Mercer, Cerys Jones, and Chloe Haines in their respective races.

Amongst the men, Howard Sawyer - a fell-runner who has recently turned to orienteering - showed his potential by achieving fifth place in the very competitive M40 class. Strength-in-depth was shown in the M50 class with Martyn Gill (6th), Tony Carlyle (6th), Michael Cox (8th) and Ken Patterson (9th). Other excellent results were achieved by the ever-green Tom Crowther (M65), Susan Stevens (W50) and Patricia Villiers (W55), all of whom claimed the runner-up spot in their races.

Over 700 young runners attended the British Schools Score Champion-ships at Gilling Woods, near York.

A Score Event involves runners visiting as many control sites as they can in a set time, with penalties for those who arrive at the finish late.

This demands not just running speed, route selection, and navigational skills but also the ability to estimate the time it will take to visit controls.

Hector Haines of Ilkley Grammar School was third in a field of over 60 runners in the 60 minute at under-17 level, whilst sister Chloe was third in the 45 minute event for under-14 girls. Not to be outdone, Florence Haines of All Saints Primary School was runner-up in the girls under-11 event. A remarkable achievement for just one family.

Details of Airienteers, events, socials, and training programmes can be found on the club's website at www.aire.org.uk.

Cross-Country

Leeds City AC's junior girls continued to demonstrate the excellence that has led them to considerable success already in this new season when club members occupied the top six spots in the U-14 girls and top five spots in the U-13 girls races at the second round of the Leeds Schools' Cross-Country League.

Following on from similar performances in the league's first round, several local Leeds City girls were again in outstanding form at the Whitkirk venue.

In the Under-14 race Jodie Gregorczyk of Menston had another battle royal with Leeds teamates, former Skyrac duo Elizabeth and Eleanor Hall. In the first league match Jodie had triumphed but this time she had to give way to the twins for third place.

In the Under-13 event, Jodie's schoolmate Jessica Best went one better than the first round finishing the Whitkirk course in a fine second place.

Not to be outdone Guiseley's Robert Hall, also of Leeds City AC, again showed his class with another third place in the U-16 boys' race. This is particularly impressive since Robert is a first year in this age.

Otley AC

Last weekend 11 members of Otley AC met at Esholt for the 10th event in the race for the Eric Smith Handicap Trophy 2004.

Colin Best was the first finisher with a net time of 35:37. Just nine seconds adrift was Graham Stead with 35:46. Ian Fisher finished third with predictably the fastest time of the event (26:49).

Other finishers (and their actual running times) were: Paul Clifford (36:05), Malcolm Court (33:01), Jennie McKenzie (40:12), Bob Payne (40:14), Tony Allen (39:04), Antonio Cardinale (39:06), Carol Armitstead (40:26) and Nick Hodgkinson (38:58). The effect of the results of this event is that Antonio has 93 points in total with Paul Clifford in second place with 90. In joint third position are Graham and Malcolm with 84 points each.

Also last weekend a group of Otley AC members travelled to Amsterdam for the annual marathon, half marathon and 10k. Phil Robinson, Peter McGouran and Ursula McGouran ran the marathon in the very good times of 3h 23:16, 3h 29:31 and 3h 43:53 respectively.

Julian Mawson opted for the half marathon and ran 73:11 for 6th position (and just 4 seconds outside his pb).

For details about Otley AC phone Chris on 01943 468109 or e-mail chris.carver@btopenworld.com or visit www.otleyac.co.uk. Training is from Otley RUFC on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 7.15pm.

Andrew is in

British squad

Horsforth 16-year-old multi-eventer, Andrew Staniland (above) has been named in the National Combined Events Squad.

The Leeds City AC athlete has been invited to join top British decathletes and heptathletes, including the likes of Dean Macey and Denise Lewis, at four weekend squad sessions over the winter.

Three of these will be held at the new High Performance Centre at Sheffield, while the fourth will be held in Chelmsford.

His inclusion comes after some fine combined events performances this summer while in the U-17 age group.

He won the gold medal in the decathlon at the AAA's Champion-ships with a score of 6,286 points.

This earned him England selection and he was the highest placed U-17 decathlete in the British Isles Comb-ined Events Cup match.

In this he scored 6,386 points which places him fourth on the UK U-17 all time ranking lists.

Andrew's season ended in September with victory in the Octath-lon at the English Schools' Combined Events Championships. He scored 5,256 points, which is the eighth best ever score by a UK U-17 athlete - Dean Macey is seventh on the same lists.

As a result Andrew has been selected to represent England Schools in an U-18 indoor pentathlon (long jump/shot/60m hurdles /200m/800m) in Glasgow in December.

Although he will not be able to perform in his usual high points scoring events of discus, javelin and high jump, Andrew is no stranger to indoor combined eventing, having won gold in the U-17 pentathlon at the AAA's Indoors back in March.