Athletics: Yorkshire's men returned from Sunday's Inter-Counties Stafford 20 Mile Road Race with a set of gold medals.

Stockport's Bashir Hussain won the individual title in 1hr 45min 39sec. He was a minute clear of Leeds City's Sean Winstanley, the ex-Bingley man pipping Staffordshire's Ray Plant for runners-up spot with Ian Fisher of Otley AC in fourth.

Idle-based Fisher posted a superb 1-46-32 on his debut at this distance

Rob Elstone of Barnsley was third counter for Yorkshire to give them team gold ahead of Greater Manchester and third place Gloucester.

Jackie Newton won the women's race and led her team Greater Manchester to victory over Yorkshire women, who packed well for silver.

Bingley's Sue Cariss lead the Yorkshire assault in seventh place in 2-14-43 and Kath Kaiser of Valley Striders was a few seconds adrift in eighth. Bradford Airedale's Andrea Dennison completed the scoring in tenth in 2-19-00 with Dewsbury's Treena Carney unfortunate to be out of the medals ten seconds behind in 12th.

The English Fell Racing Championship got underway with the Noon Stone nine mile race at Mankinholes near Todmorden and winner Gavin Bland of Borrowdale described it as "the wettest, slippiest, sliding event" he'd ever done.

Bingley's in-form Robert Jebb finished runner-up, 30 seconds behind the winner.

Simon Booth was third followed by Bingley's Mark Kinch who turned in a superb performance for fourth spot ahead of Jim Davis with reigning English and British champion Ian Holmes in sixth.

With Mark Croasdale in 15th and Robin Lawrence in 25th the Bingley men couldn't stop Borrowdale taking the team award as the Cumbrians packed seven runners in the top 17 to finish.

Bradford Airedale veteran Steve Oldfield was 20th overall and third vet over-40 and was reasonably satisfied in an event which didn't suit him.

Ilkley's Tracey Ambler ran as unattached and won the women's race. Tracey and her husband will be moving to Wales shortly and the popular runner will be sadly missed in our region.

Joanne Prowse ran her first fell race since being injured at the end of November. The Keighley and Craven star is the current English Veteran champion and was more than pleased with her ninth position overall and second vet spot.

With Liz Tomes third vet in 11th and Freda Tate in support it paved the way for a Keighley and Craven women's team success over Clayton-Le-Moors.

Bingley veteran Mike Smith posted some fast times but was outside the medals in the European Veteran Champion-ships in Malmo, Sweden. Despite being troubled with back problems for the past two weeks Smith finished fourth in both the 800m and 1500m events.

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