BURY AC's senior men’s team led the way in the first fixture of the Red Rose Cross Country League at a wet and blustery Leigh last weekend.

Oliver Makinson was Bury’s first finisher in 11th place, covering the 10k course in 35mins 50secs.

Josh Birmingham took an excellent 14th (36:09) with Jim Ardin and Jon Evans in close order in 17th and 18th (36:15 and 36:28 respectively).

The final two counters were Luke Harreld (21st in 37:12) and Patrick Babb (25th in 37:27).

The close packing gave Bury an outstanding second place in the team competition behind a strong Blackburn team.

This is Bury’s highest finish in the senior men’s competition for many years even though a couple of key team members were missing.

Other Bury finishers included Jack Griffiths (42nd), Kamili Bell (49th), Giles Bennett (74th), Gary Crowshaw (84th), Christopher Barrow (92nd), Anthony Hallahan (118th), Andy Worthington (159th), Steve Parker (178th) and Alison Dale (184th).

The senior women’s team also performed well, finishing in third place overall.

The counting athletes were Katie Geelan in 12th (21:49), Caitlin Cole 14th (21:56) and Christie Cook 18th (22:03).

The close packing represented a great team effort and the fact that they held off Rossendale by just five points underlined the vital contribution from each athlete.

The other Bury finishers were Sophie Whittaker (34th), Katrina Conroy (35th), Lizzi Cheshire (41st), Fran Pearson (55th), Lucy Alcock (58th), Nicola Harland (61st), Susan Ward (83rd), Afroditi Kalambouka (111th), Susan Lawson (118th) and Nicola Whitfield (141st).

The under-17s men’s team took fourth place with Stefan Kalambouka running strongly to take fourth place, supported by team-mates Oliver Donnelly and Jacob Stevens in 16th and 26th respectively.

Charlotte Speakman-Farnworth was Bury’s sole u17 woman competitor, winning her event.

The u13 girls’ team of Reilly Carson (17th), Katie Rayner (25th) and Chloe Ardin took fifth place.

The other finishers included Summer Whitfield (40th) and Nicole Palmer (56th).

The girls outperformed the boys, who took sixth place, the counters being Kieran Chadwick (21st), Noah Carter (22nd) and Finley Collings (25th).

Other finishers were Adam Warren (26th), Jayden Barlow (42nd), Albert Cottam (50th) and Dexter Fowler-Gibbs (53rd).

The u15 girls’ team also took sixth place, with Freya Potts (sixth), Erin Kenyon (33rd) and Charlie Ireland (34th) scoring and Holy Crow being the other finisher in 36th.

The boys took seventh place with Rocksan Min Feng (24th), David Vaughan (25th) and Nathan Ardin (27th) scoring. Matthew Lowe (28th) and Joe Hamer (31st) were the other finishers.

The u11s girls took seventh place with Emily Purdey (ninth), Tia Buckley (26th) and Phoebe Collings (44th) the scorers.

Lily Crow (54th), Summer Barlow (61st), Blessing Idoko (62nd), Olivia Green (64th), Isabelle Whitworth (76th), Orlagh Conway (79th), Erin O’Reilly (82nd) and Darcey Fowler-Gibbs (85th) were the other finishers.

The boys’ team of Thomas Donnelly (15th), Jake Norton (29th) and Ciaron O’Reilly (33rd) finished in eighth place.

Ben Gardner (41st), Thomas Gibson (49th), Kian Bleakley (64th), Daniel Norton (73rd) and Barney Ainsworth (80th) were the club’s other finishers.

Sunday saw two of Bury’s senior men set new personal bests in the Manchester Half Marathon.

Ben Coop took a brilliant 16th place, smashing his previous best by more than a minute and a half with a very classy 1:10:36 in the high-quality field.

The rain seemed to agree with Bury athletes as in the Leicester Marathon Byron Edwards set a new best of 2:52:01 taking ninth place. Both athletes have been training hard and are reaping the rewards of their dedication.

Bury had four other competitors in the Manchester Half Marathon.

Rob Lawson ran 1:43:46, Steve Tobias was hot on his heels with 1:44:24, Nigel Brady ran 1:58:52 and Brianne Turner enjoyed her 2:07:52 effort.