There was a great team effort by the Cornwall Men’s and Ladies’ teams in the weekend’s Plymouth Hoe 10 mile road race, which includes the annual Pensular Challenge between Cornwall and Devon.  Despite starting as second favourites in both competitions, Cornwall came within a whisker of double gold.

On a hillier route than before, Emma Stallard romped home to a great victory in the Ladies’ race, finishing 33rd overall in 1.01.58, leading the Cornish girls to team victory against the odds.  She was ably backed up by Lucy Kelvey of Newquay Road Runners in 3rd and Anne Luke (Tamar  Trotters), who was 5th.  Our Suzy Bosustow, suffering from a cold and not enjoying the best run of her life, hung in for 10th  to give the team a very narrow victory.

The County team :- Lucy Kelvey, Em, Suzy, Anne Luke

Kathryn Burgess also didn’t have the best of runs but finished in 14th (1.10.47) to give CAC a comfortable club team win and Kirstie Mutsaers, accompanied by hubbie Adrian, ran another personal bst of 1.23.24, finishing 317th overall out of the 650 entrants.

The Cornish men tied with a strong Devon team but lost out on countback.  Kairn Stone from Plymouth won easily, with Matt Pullen of CAC pulling clear of Newquay’s Ollie Gibson for an excellent 2nd in 54.05.   Hayle’s Pete Ellis was 5th behind Ollie’s 3rd and Mounts Bay’s Sam Hill was 9th.  Victory would surely have been Cornwall’s if their number one runner, Kevin Toher (Newquay Road Runners), had not been forced to drop mout due to injury.

CAC again took the club team prize, with Steve Wherry clocking a personal best of 1.00.07 in 21st, Justin Thomas going well in 26th (1.00.22) and Matt Lewis running a minute slower than at Camborne (29th in 1.01.19) but holding on well enough to bring the team home in 1st place.

Well done men!  More trophies for you.

Phil Bolt had a decent run in 69th, just outkicking Suzy B, in 1.06.52, with Adrian Mutsaers running with Kirstie in 318th.

Phil 'The Thinker' Bolt analyses his race