TAVISTOCK athletes rounded off a successful year with their Christmas Handicap race held on the penultimate day of 2012. This annual event attracted senior and junior club members of the club along with a number of their family and friends.

The 4.1 mile course on Whitchurch Down was the same as in previous years and conditions were good for the event with dry moderate weather.

The runners of all ages got underway over a 17 and a half minute phased start based on their individual handicaps. The first runner home winning the ladies' trophy was Lucy Steven, the youngest runner in the event, in an excellent run time of 38 minutes 6 secs. This reflected an impressive improvement of more than four minutes on her 2011 time. The second runner home was veteran runner Tony Shearer, winning the men's trophy in his first appearance in this event. He recorded a strong run time of 33mins 13secs. The third runner to finish was Alice Rogers in an excellent time of 27mins 18secs - the fastest ladies time in the race. It also reflects the strength of the running of this up-and-coming international modern pentathlete.

Caroline Steven was the next runner home followed by Rebecca Windemer in fifth. U17s runner Harrison Baker finished in overall sixth place in an outstanding time of 24mins 2secs. This reflected an improvement of over a minute on Harrison's previous year's time and was recorded as the overall fastest time of the day.