Orran Smith retained the marathon class of the No Rest For The Wicked Series that concluded on his home patch in the west of the island recently.

The 41-year-old was the highest league scorer in all six races, winning two of the events outright - the Northern 10k and Foxdale Six.

Outside of the league, he finished second to Christian Varley in the opening marathon, also runner-up to 17-year-old Ieaun Owen in both the Peel Hill and Heritage Trail races.

Completing an amazing week he was fifth in the Killer Mile won by Oxford University student Gwilym Jones.

Smith’s final overall accumulated time was less than five hours for six events (a total mileage a tad short of 50 miles).

It gave him a substantial winning margin of 41min 45sec over fellow Peel man Paul Atherton (Western AC), who finished top-10 in last year’s Parish Walk.

All-rounder Joey Bond was third, in turn 8m 26s behind Atherton, followed by Kirk Michael’s Matt Callister who spent several hours in A&E after the Killer Mile suffering from the effects of dehydration.

Peel Golf Club greenkeeper Geoff Rice was fifth, first over 50, and seasoned fell runner Tom Cringle sixth.

Limbering up for next month’s triathlon, Kirsty Arnold was the leading female in seventh spot, 2m 44s ahead of Helen Taylor who she finished alongside in the opening 26-miler. Amy Lace of the host club was a solid third.

Vikings hockey player Steven Underwood produced an excellent string of performances to win the Half-Marathon No Rest for the Wicked Series.

He was 13th in the half-marathon, precisely two-and-a-half minutes in front of former London Marathon finisher Tim Knott.

Underwood pulled all of that back and more in the following evening’s hill race at Peel, after which the pair were fairly equally matched.

Five-time Parish Walk winner Richard Gerrard showed his endurance by finishing third, 32s down on Knott, with Sam Quilleash, Stephen Caley and former Manx Mountain Marathon winner Nigel Armstrong rounding off the top six.

Dawn Atherton, wife of marathon series runner-up Paul, won the women’s ’half’ series.

Ironically, it was virtually all won and lost in the opening 13.1 mile road run round one lap of the Ramsey marathon course.

In registering a personal best 1hr 35m 17s time, she was 3m 02s ahead of QEII PE teacher Rebekah Pate and 4m 45s ahead of Onchan’s Becky Watterson.

The latter was the best of the three in the following evening’s hill race, with Atherton dropping more than one minute to Watterson, who eked another four seconds out of the Western AC woman in the Northern 10k.

The Killer Mile league honours went Pate, who admitted she had not run competitively until the recent lockdown, with Atherton losing another 16s to Watterson.

Thursday’s Foxdale Six again saw former footballer Watterson first woman overall in a strong 42.58, alongside her brother Jordan, pulling out 15s on Pate, with Atherton fourth woman overall (behind marathion class winner Kirsty Arnold), dropping 40s to Pate and 55s to Watterson.

The latter woman had another stormer in the Heritage Trail Run that brought the series to a close the following evening, taking 49s out of Pate and 2m 06s out of Atherton.

But it still wasn’t enough to dislodge the Western AC woman from the lead she had led throughout the 36-mile contest.

Atherton was 12th overall, 57s ahead of Pate, with Watterson another seven seconds adrift in third at the end of an intriguing contest. Sandwiched between the three women was leading junior Jayden Fayle in 14th place overall.

Thank yous

A huge record number of 74 runners completed the half-marathon series and 17 the marathon series.

There were record entries for most of the runs, despite the lack of off-island athletes, and the only time the sun didn’t shine was for the Peel Hill race.

Well done to all of the runners, also to Jackie and Barry Moore for co-ordinating the series, Mo Kelly for her excellent work in compiling the results and tables.

Isle of Man Veteran Athletes’ Club, Western AC, Northern AC, Manx Harriers and Manx Fell Runners for organising the events, Peel Football Club for the use of their facilities on Friday, Robinson’s Fresh Foods, and A & J Butchers for their contributions to the post-series buffet.

Last, but by no means least the series sponsors - Bell Burton Associates; Garage Door and Gate Automation Company; Up & Running (Isle of Man) Ltd.

RESULTS

Marathon series (total 49.1 miles): 1, Orran Smith, accumulative time 4hr 54min 30sec; 2, Paul Atherton 5:36.15; 3, Joey Bond 5:44.41; 4, Matt Callister 5:54.18; 5, Geoff Rice 5:55.34; 6, Tom Cringle 5:56.42; 7, Kirsty Arnold 6:33.57; 8, Helen Taylor 6:36.41; 9, Amy Lace 6:44.11; 10, Richard George 6:50.44; 11, Bernie Johnson 7:08.45; 12, Shaun McEntee 7:33.06; 13, Mike Hayler 7:35.15; 14, Ashley Sandyford-Sykes 7:40.11; 15, Jayne Farquhar 7:43.53; 16, James Cochrane 7:51.06; 17, Kerri Williams 8:20.55. There were five non-starters and also one non-finisher.

Half-Marathon series (total 36 miles): 1, Steven Underwood, total combined time 4hr 01min 25sec; 2, Tim Knott 4:03.06; 3, Richard Gerrard 4:03.38; 4, Sam Quilleash 4:04.30; 5, Stephen Caley 4:05.05; 6, Nigel Armstrong 4:12.46; 7, Neil Crowe 4:15.49; 8, Paul Curphey 4:17.10; 9. Phil Littlejohns 4:25.35; 10, Colin Mackie 4:25.42; 11, Adam Fretwell 4:27.09; 12, Dawn Atherton 4:27.45; 13, Paul Rodgers 4:28.07; 14, Jayden Fayle 4:28.13; 15, Rebekah Pate 4:28.42; 16, Becky Watterson 4:28.49; 17, Adey Callister 4:30.43; 18, Raymond Whitfield 4:36.43; 19, Conor McCaughan 4:38.08; 20, Peter Callin 4:39.49; 21, Ali Stennett 4:42.56; 22, Nick Watterson 4:44.26; 23, Gary Sherry 4:47.50; 24, Aaron Schade 4:48.09; 25, Dawn Yates 4:48.33; 26, Joanne Schade 4:49.03; 27, Catriona Watt 4:50.53; 28, Julian Corlett 4:50.56; 29, Shaun Callow 4:53.59; 30, Charlie Elliott 4:56.05; 31, Ed Wilson 4:58.14; 32, Dale Wassall 4:58.15; 33, Geoff Quayle 4:59.09; 34, Anton Bolton 4:59.41; 35, Maggie Watkins 5:00.27; 36, Caroline Moran 5:05.06; 37, Brian Butler 5:07.21; 38, Ian Hughes 5:07.34; 39, Sarah Collings 5:07.44; 40, Graham Allott 5:10.41; 41, Andy Dawson 5:15.09; 42, Jason Coole 5:16.30; 43, Chris Wade 5:20.04; 44, Beccy Miller 5:24.57; 45, Alex Parkes 5:25.59; 46, Kevin Holmes 5:27.47; 47, Mike Devereau 5:30.20; 48, Huw Jones 5:33.03; 49, Nikki Sharpe 5:34.51; 50, Jackie Zhi Qiang Ho 5:36.22; 51, Laura Carson 5:38.47; 52, Melanie Williamson 5:44.17; 53, Fiona Bullough 5:47.36; 54, Rebecca Norrey 5:47.55; 55, Alanna Pritchard 5:48.46; 56, Sharon Cain 5:49.15; 57, Lynsey Christian 5:49.53; 58, Dave Lawrie 5:56.29; 59, Jason Cochrane 5:57.41; 60, Moira Hall 6:04.43; 61, Candice Jones 6:07.42; 62, Ann-Marie Clucas 6:13.54; 63, Katie Lawrence 6:25.18; 64, Denise Gimbert 6:26.30; 65, Denise Bridson 6:27.59; 66, Angie Robinson 6:29.22; 67, Melanie Christian 6:30.57; 68, Susan Penton 6:40.40; 69, Geoff Hall 6:41.42; 70, Natalie Wiseman 6:46.36; 71, Karen Gadsby 6:51.44; 72, Michael Penton 7:00.30; 73, Alan Pilling 7:04.32; 74, Colin Crooks 7:09.52. There were 10 non-starters as well as one non-finisher.