Island Games triple gold medallist Christa Cain set a new 10k personal best as she finished second in the Greek Championships in Athens over the weekend.

The Manxwoman was invited to compete in the event by online sports retailer Pro Direct Sport and sportswear giant Adidas.

The Douglas woman finished runner-up in a time of 34 minutes 45 seconds, shaving eight seconds off her previous best for the event.

Christa was the only athlete from the British Isles to get onto the podium in any of the variety of races held at the championships which finished in the historic Panathenaic Stadium.

Also competing in Athens was Douglas’ Ollie Venables, who completed the event’s marathon in an time of 3 hours 23 minutes and 58 seconds - a huge 35 minutes taken off his pb.

In running the event, Ollie raised more than £3,000 for island charity Isle Listen.

- Also in Europe, Phil Knox and Rory Dearden both shattered their marathon personal bests in Nice, the former taking exactly six minutes off his previous best set in Manchester in 2023 with a time of 2:44.47.

Dearden improved his pb by an even bigger margin, removing more than 10 minutes from his Manchester time from 2024 with 2:46:02.

It was a great morning for the Hall family too at the event in the south of France. Samantha was running her debut marathon and targeting a time of under four hours. She absolutely obliterated that target with a time of 3:37.22, running almost identical splits for each half of the race.

Her dad Martin finished six minutes ahead of her with a very impressive time of 3:31.13.

Former RYCOB footballer Ruairi Poole also competed and clocked a very good time of 3:50.46.

DAVID GRIFFITHS