THE LONDON Marathon took over the country’s capital at the end of last month and 14 Rugby & Northampton athletes were among the almost 40,000 runners half of whom broke the three-hour barrier.
Leading the athletics club home was Stephen Marks with a superb time of two hours, 42 minutes and 42 seconds, to finish in 420th place overall. The 38-year-old crossed the line almost seven minutes ahead of Dave Rayfield, whose time of 2:49.34 in 814th position put the 50-year-old 23rd in his age category.
Chris Lamb was the next man over the line for R&N in 947th spot with a time of 2:51.31, and Dean Oldfield recorded 2:56.58 for 1519th, while Daniel Mould was fifth home for the club in 2:57.24 (1,584th).
The first R&N female representative to finish was Amy Sarkies, who claimed 58th place (2:57.25), and she was followed by Sally Baker, who also dipped inside three hours (86th, 2:59.49) to clinch seventh in the W45 age group.
The youngest runner representing the club on Sunday was Conor Hills and he completed his debut marathon in 3:01.30 (2,206th).
Tamara Hardman, the club’s ladies cross country champion, finished the race in 121st position with 3:04.02, which was enough for 13th in the over-45 section, and not far behind was Jonathan Sarkies in 3:04.53 (2,584th).
Adrian White recorded 3:11.33 (3,426th) and held off Dame Kelly Holmes until the final 2k before the double Olympic Champion went past to finish just six seconds ahead.
Finishing in a time of 3:12.54 was long-serving R&N stalwart Pete Thomas, earning 3,620th place overall, and Vicky Nealson was less than two minutes behind to claim 347th (3:14.49) in the ladies category. Meanwhile, Tim Coffey crossed the finish line in 3:51:15 (11,406th).