Athletics: The opening round of fixtures in the men's Northern Leagues provided a hectic weekend of track and field action for the region's clubs.

A severely depleted Bingley team travelled to Stockport in Division Two Central, and finished fourth behind Sale, Salford and host club Stockport.

Former international Colin Moore provided the highlight of the afternoon as he stormed to victory in the 5,000 metres in 14min 34.4sec, and in the process soundly beating Bashir Hussain into second place.

Yorkshire shot putt champion Ian Lindley required just one throw to win his event and under-20 pair Dominic Thewliss and Wesley Trevino gained useful points in the high jump, both clearing 1.75m.

Bradford Airedale had their fair share of success in Division 5C at the same venue in finishing runners-up to Burnley. M Gregory was a double winner in both 110m hurdles and the triple jump while Paul Jennings won the 400m and was second in the 200m. The club rounded things off with a victory in the 4 x 400 relay, beating Stockport by a tenth of a second.

In the Division 5SE fixture at Cudworth, Holmfirth's Dave Watson had a superb victory in the 5,000m, clocking 14-40 with Keighley and Craven's Martin Horbury a distant runner-up in 16-07.

Keighley's track captain Adrian Jones tasted victory in the 800m and 1500m races while team-mate Kirk Johnson was victorious in both 100m and 200m sprints. James Callaghan had a return to form with a win in the 3,000m steeplechase as did Darren Brame, who won the B event.

In Division 3C at Bury, Spenborough were runners-up to East Cheshire. Pudsey and Bramley were third and Longwood sixth.

Spen's Andries Bentley powered to victory in the 400m hurdles ahead of Pudsey's Gavin Lamb. The positions were reversed, however, in the 110m hurdles.

Longwood's Ian Mitchell won a thrilling 800m race by a half a second from Pudsey's Herman in 1-55-1 and Spenborough's Nick Cammen won the shot before his team took the 4 x 400 relay.

Bingley's boys team won their Northern One East McDonald's fixture at Rotherham. Oliver Brewer set the day off by winning the under-17 400m hurdles and this was followed by wins for Ben Manchester, James Sausby, Rhys Bartle and Matthew Ackers-Johnson. Sam Flack took the under-17 high jump and pole vault and Ben Ambler was a double winner in the under-13 800m and long jump.

The Leeds Marathon was won in convincing style by Graham Hill, son of former European champion Ron Hill, in 2hrs 23min 53sec.

The women's title went once again to Elinor Robinson (Borders) in just 11 seconds over three hours. The Derbyshire-based athlete had the distinction of finishing third overall in last year's 1000 mile event in Australia, when she covered the distance in just over 15 days, so Sunday's win was just a sprint.

Denise Dean of Pudsey Pacers, who was the early leader, had to settle for second with Horsforth's Nicola Wilde producing a personal best of 3-14-44 for third.

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