St Albans Striders celebrated their annual awards dinner – with two new entrants to the club’s hall of fame.

Herts Advertiser: Jack Brooks at the Halifax marathon in 2014Jack Brooks at the Halifax marathon in 2014 (Image: Archant)

Lizzie Barber and Jack Brooks are the newest inductees. Barber, who is 71, capped a fine running career with a time of 49 minutes 23 seconds in the Flitwick 10K earlier this year while Brooks is set to compete in his 400th marathon early in the New Year when he heads to Louisiana.

Jen Conway was named Strider of the Year, while Stephen Buckle and Deirdre Heydecker picked up the male and female athlete of the year awards respectively.

Claire Sharp and Andrew McKillop were named most improved Striders and Jim King and Amy Tanner were this year’s club champions.

There was still plenty of competition action, with four Striders finishing the St Neots Half Marathon on Sunday.

Tim Searle and Linda Cassidy clocked personal bests in times of one hour 28 minutes 10 seconds and 2:16:36 respectively. Anna Buckingham (1:38:46), Rose Mcginness (1:54:44) were the other finishers.

Elsewhere Trevor Clements (51:13), Richard Maw (55:56) and Peter Blackaller (57:41) braved the cold, mud and Chiltern hills to complete the Herbert’s Hole 10k Challenge, while Jordan Lister (50:54) and Ian Simpson (54:44) both completed the Box Hill edition of the Tough 10 series.

Stephen Hosty (38:52) and Scott Mayes (42:59) completed the 9Bar Chilly 10k in Wiltshire’s Castle Combe before tackling the duathlon event, each finishing their second race of the day in under an hour.

Back in St Albans, more than 50 Striders took part in the parkrun at Verulamium Park, including the first male (Thomas Crouch) and female (Wendy Walsh) finishers. Striders also turned out in eight other parkrun events, with first places finishes for Stephen Buckle (Luton Wardown), Blake Vivian (Aldenham) and Simon Fraser (Stevenage).