Bedford & County AC's Senior men were in fine form at the English National 6 Stage Road Relay Championship at Sutton Park, Birmingham on Sat 8th  October. With the club having qualified 2 teams for the 6 x 5.9k relay hopes were high that both teams would be finish well up the field, with the A team possibly making the podium.

The A team got off to a solid start on leg 1 with Harry Brodie running an excellent 17:35, bringing the team home in 16thplace of the 81 starters. Ed Blythman, running for the B team was close behind in 33rd place with 17:59. Despite being far from fully fit, Dan Jarvis gained 5 places to 11th with his time of 17:43. Ben Davies had a fine run moving the B team up to 30th place with 18:01. On leg 3, Matt Bergin continued his return to form, from injury and illness, moving up to 10thwith 17:50. Meanwhile, John Eves blasted the B team up 10 places to 20th with his fine 18:02. On leg 4, veteran athlete Darren Deed showed that he can still compete with those half his age, with another fine run of 17:52, although he slipped back one place to 11th. James Minter kept the B team moving forward with a very solid 18:12 for 19th place. Sam Winters had another fine run on leg 5 easing the A team up to 8th place with his 17:55. The improving Craig Emmerson with a run of 18:22 gained another 4 places moving in to  15th place and more importantly, the leading B team position. Bedford’s final leg runner Ben Alcock, who lost a shoe doing this same leg last year, set off chasing hard, but despite running an excellent 17:23 was only able to move the A team up one place to 7th with a total time of 1:46:18, the 4th best time ever by a Bedford team on this course. Super sub Joe Strange again brought into the team at the last minute had another fine run recording 19:01. Despite fighting hard he was unable to hold on to the leading B team position, slipping to what was still a great 17th overall and 2nd B team. The team time of  1:49:38 representing sub-5 minute miling for 22.0 undulating miles!

The focus now moves to cross country running with the season kicking off with the first Chiltern League fixture at Oxford next Saturday, followed by the National CC Relays a few weeks later.