The skies cleared, the rain stopped, the wind dropped. What more could the runners in the Exe to Axe ask for apart, perhaps, for a few less hills and some bigger sign posts. There is a link to the results above and hopefully there wil be some photos up shortly. We have literally thousands of photos so, as usual, they are available to runners but there are too many to display. If you want a pictorial memento, let us have your Race Number and I am sure we can find one.

As organisers of the Exe to Axe Run last weekend we were delighted at the dramatic improvement in the weather over the Saturday night. As a result conditions were ideal on Sunday morning with the going soft underfoot but not slippery and cloudless skies all the way.

The run is not easy, taking in 20.3 miles of the Coastal Path from Exmouth to Seaton and over that distance it is easy to take a wrong turn somewhere along the line. That is all part of this particular race and a few runners did clock up some unnecessary miles. The local runners of course have no such navigational problems and it is this knowledge that leads many of them to opt out of the much tougher second half, from Sidmouth onwards.

Justin Ashby was well up at the sharp end of the race from start to finish. Having completed the 4 Trigs, Grizzly and this one in the space of 6 weeks he is starting to feel the strain but can be justifiably proud of his 3 hours 19 minutes finishing time which put him in 12^th place overall and 1^st Sidmouth runner home. David Rampersad is also becoming a regular at these sort of events and did well some 12 and a half minutes behind Justin. David Palmer, a long distance cyclist by heart, can also clock up the miles on foot and as always finished with a smile. Andy Shearer completed his London training with an impressively solid run whilst training partners Debbie and Don, we are convinced, chatted for the whole distance.

We did also put together some relay teams. Brian Gosling and Shaun Tipton struck up a useful partnership and went head to head with Bill Valentine and Kerry Gibbons. Shaun got his team off to a very good start. So much so that Bill, who had organised a lift back with the Goslings became anxious and set off in hot pursuit of Brian before his first leg runner had finished. Husband and wife, Chris and Arthur Vince, had a novel approach with Chris running from the start to Budleigh and, after Arthur had coped with the middle 2 legs, she took over again from Branscombe to the finish.

We must also thank Fiona Cummins for running the whole distance as ‘Tail End Charlie’. Running with the stragglers sounds easy but be assured it’s even more tiring. Meanwhile daughter Sasha along with Jenny Reay, Mick Allen and Andy Concannon opted instead for the Teignbridge 10. That’s a good race too but lacks the visual impact of the Exe to Axe.