THREE members of Harwich Runners took part in a prestigious running event in Ipswich.

The five kilometre race attracted an elite field, which included GB international runners.

Among the runners, who all needed to qualify for the start line with a sub 20 minute time, were Harwich’s Richard Flutter, Bill Haining and Tom Stafford.

The race was won by Ryan McLeod, of Tipton, in 14 minutes 10 seconds.

Flutter finished the winding circuit in a time of 19m 33s, three seconds ahead of team-mate Haining.

New member Tom Stafford followed in a time of 20m 9s.

There was also a mass entry 10km race and Stafford also took part in that, placing 213th out of almost 700 entrants in a time of 49m 25s.

Johnny Zeeuw completed this distance in 44m 15s, to place 106th overall.

Taking on something very different was ultra-distance specialist James Mann who competed in the Spitfire Scramble Ultra marathon.

With the idea being to run as far as possible in a 24 hour period, Mann completed an exceptional 77 miles and finished in 11th place.

Two other members also took part.

Francis Mills was part of a relay team and completed two laps, almost 12 miles.

Experienced ultra runner Liz Smith managed 11 laps a distance of approximately 65 miles in the allowed time.

The third event of the weekly Harwich Parkrun attracted runners from as far afield as Peterborough, Surrey and Dagenham, but it was local athletes from Harwich Runners that dominated proceedings.

Mark Lloyd established the lead from the outset, which he gradually increased throughout the race, returning to the bandstand well clear of the 49 other runners in 18m 6s, a 16 second improvement on last week’s performance.

In second place, nearly two minutes clear of the next runner home, was Mark Rutter (18m 54s) in his first appearance there.

Madeline Lewis was the first woman and fourth overall over the line in 20m 56s, setting a new female course record in the process.

Lewis is showing the benefit of regular weekly parkruns having improved her time in each event so far, and bettered her first run by almost a minute.

Others among the 18 Harwich Runners to finish in the top ten were Archie Barrington (8th in 21m 48s), competing in the 11-13 age group, and William Roxby-Clarke (9th in 22m 16s).

Once again Elspeth Knott, third woman and 14th overall in 23m 45s, produced an outstanding performance.

She recorded the highest age grading score (86.7 per cent) – which takes into account age and gender to give a comparison with others in different groups.

Anne Piercy also had a good run knocking 23 seconds off her previous best time to finish in 26m 19s, with the fourth best overall age grading score of 72.7 per cent.