Studland Stampede

Several Honiton runners took a mini bus to beautiful Studland in Dorset to take part in the Studland Stampede 12k race last Sunday. This is a tough off-road race that takes runners over heath land and sandy beaches offering stunning views of Old Harry Rocks, Brownsea Island and the Isle of Wight. The race is fairly flat but the last 2 ½ miles is particularly tough with runners having to cope with soft sand in the dunes and then 2 miles of beach back to the finish. The race was won by Andrew Ridley in a time of 45 minutes 55 seconds and the first back for Honiton was Kevin Hawker who came 6th in 48:08. Tom Bornet is a regular at this race and he came 35th in 54:47. Rod Inglis had yet another great race to finish 41st in 55:22 and he was followed by Steve Davey who came 55th in 56:51. Howard Bidmead had organised the club outing and he was delighted with his race to come 82nd in 58:57. Stephen Boyes had overtaken Judy Davey on the sand dunes and he did well to come 91st in 1:00:17 with Judy coming 6 places and 37 seconds later. Nick and Sandra Thorpe couldn’t remember the last time they had raced so they were pleased with their finish positions of 296 and 368 respectively with times of 1:14:08 and 1:19:56. Gerry Evans enjoyed his race coming 407th in 1:25:29 and Wendy Williams took a tumble bruising her leg as well as her ego. She finished 424th in 1:29:39. There were 446 finishers. Upon their return, finishers were given a wonderful goody bag packed full of beauty products, flapjack and jam!