RADCLIFFE AC's flying Fiona Lynch was the first woman finisher in the gruelling Three Towers Ultra Marathon, covering the 44 miles and 8,000 feet of climbing in 9hrs 3mins 52 secs.

Five from the club took on Saturday’s physically and mentally challenging race in the West Pennines, with participants required to navigate the unmarked route which visited the Jubilee, Rivington and Peel towers.

Lynch, who was first woman at the recent Bury 10k, ran with Radcliffe team-mate Craig Norman.

They finished together in ninth and 10th overall, despite losing around 20 minutes after taking the wrong route.

Wrigley was 11th out of the 52-strong field in 9:23:05, while Helen Andrew was 25th in 10:25:25 – a place ahead of Mike Cooke who ran 10:26:26.

The victories for the club continued when Neal Emmerson won Sunday’s Rochdale Half Marathon in a superb personal best of 1:13:31, knocking nearly a minute off his previous mark.

Stephen Birtwistle ran 1:41:12 and Dave Rushton clocked 1:43:45.

In the Rochdale 10k in the same day, Peter Cook celebrated his fist age-group win to take first Vet-60 in 48:16.

Wife Kirsten Cook was second Vet-55 in 53:39, Sarah Rushton ran 1:03:07, Lisa Donnelly clocked 1:16:26 and Christine Berry finished in 1:22:54.

There was yet another win when Robert Short clocked 38:23 to take first place by 11 seconds in the Alison Brady Memorial 10k in Bolton.

The great results continued with an age-group win for Paula Abernethy in the Chester Metric Marathon in a personal best of 2:05:15.

She was first Vet-50 and 13th woman over the 26.2k (16.3-mile) course around the city's landmarks and countryside.

Jenny Yates completed the event as a training run for the upcoming Yorkshire Marathon, where she will run for England Masters, finishing 18th female and third Vet-50 in 2:09:28.

Mark Garner ran the full-length Chester Marathon on the same day in 4:02:14.