Bored of tarmac? Why not go off road?

The following races make up the championship for 2023.
Race | Date | Type | Distance |
Silverdale Circuit | 11/02/23 | Trail | 20 miles |
Bleasdale Circle | 18/02/23 | Fell | 5 miles |
Trotters Trail Race | 05/03/23 | Trail | 4.5 miles |
Wardle Skyline | 08/04/23 | Fell | 7 miles |
Rivington 10m | 16/04/23 | Trail | 10 miles |
Wray Caton Moor | 25/04/23 | Fell | 6 miles |
Astley Park Trail Race | 03/05/23 | Trail | 3.7 miles |
Pinhaw Moor Trail Race | 05/05/23 | Trail | 5 miles |
Yarrow Valley Bluebell 10k | 14/05/23 | Trail | 6 miles |
Hutton Roof Fell Race | 27/05/23 | Fell | 7 miles |
Leo Pollard Memorial Race | 01/06/23 | Fell | 7.5 miles |
Paddy’s Pole | 06/06/23 | Fell | 4 miles |
Race the Train | 18/06/23 | Trail | 11 miles |
Aggies Staircase | 22/06/23 | Fell | 4 miles |
20 Barriers | 04/07/23 | Trail | 5 miles |
Harrock Hill | 26/07/23 | Trail | 5 miles |
Beetham Sports | 29/07/23 | Fell | 6 miles |
Golf Ball | 23/08/23 | Fell | 5.5 miles |
Hodder Valley Show | 09/09/23 | Fell | 8 miles |
Worsley Woods | 24/09/23 | Trail | 5 miles |
Full details of all the races can be found here.
Review of 2023 off road series
THE KING ISN’T DEAD – LONG LIVE THE KING

Forget football – that is won by oil money. Forget F1 – they make the rules up as they go along. Forget Rugby – The All Blacks always win that – and the Olympics – The Chinese have that in the bag. You want real competition…look no further…..
Alek Walker has finally emerged triumphant after a relentless 8 month struggle with Tom Crabtree over the WRR 2023 off road race series. There was only one question on everyone lips in the Beesley Green community centre at 8:30am on a humid Sunday morning in late September – could Tom somehow gain a low enough score to knock Alek off his perch? All he needed was a top 10 finish and for about 300 runners to turn up. Well he got 10th place, but with only 239 runners in the race his score of 0.042 wasn’t quite low enough to make the difference. Even though he won the battle with Alek, it wasn’t quite good enough to win the war, and Alek’s cumulative score of 0.35 has made him the champion.
Alek set the bar high early on, and by May already had his best 3 trail races, all finishing within the top 3% in them all. Not to be outdone, Tom, like a well seasoned poker player, matched his hand then slightly bettered it. It was all to play for on the fells. Aleks “short cut” certainly helped him at Wardle Skyline, but was never ruled out by VAR, so the result stood. Tom came top 11% or better in all his fell races, so Alek still had to put it in on one of his other races. That race turned out to be Golf Ball, on an summer evening so wet and dull you just wanted to turn up, tune out and get through it. Not only did Alek get through it, he managed to finish within the top 10% of the field and substantially reduce his overall score and place one hand on the title. This was the result that may have been a step too far for Tom.
Further down the table, Carl Groome beat Steve Myerscough into third place following his score at Worlsley, Ian Hogg who had a great season and made great improvements on last season came first male under 35, newcomers Kay Twist and Rob Dansons made great debut seasons finishing first woman and first male vet 55 respectively. Sally Deacon used the last race to leap frog Kirsty Holland into ladies runner up and leaving Kirsty with the female under 35 title.
31 competitors took part in the 2023 off road series, and we’ll hopefully see the likes of John Naylor, Finley McCalman, Stuart Grice and Martin Bates a bit more next season. Each race had Wesham representatives with a maximum attendance of 14 at Astley Park. Ian Hogg completed 18 out of the 20 races, completing the most races for a second year in a row.
The final results:
Alek 0.35, Tom 0.37, Carl 1.21, Steve 1.24, Ian 2.39, Kay 3.14, Rob 4.69, Sally 5.17, Kirsty 5.21
2023 Championships
In total there are 10 trail races and 10 fell races – advice on kit for fell races can be found here. Final kit requirements are made by the race organisers but always be prepared with full kit (waterproof top & leggings, map, compass, whistle, hat and gloves).
Prizes are determined by using the following criteria.
To qualify, you must complete a minimum of 3 fell races and 3 trail races.
Lowest score wins – scores are made up by dividing your finish position by the number of competitors in the race – the higher up the results you are, the lower your score.
Results 2023
Race 20 Worsley Woods

Race 19 Hodder Valley
Race 18 Golf Ball

Race 17 Beetham




Race 16 Harrock Hill

Race 15 20 Barriers

Race 14 Aggies Staircase

Race 13 Race the Train
Race 12 Paddys Pole

Race 11 Leo Pollard memorial race
Race 10 Hutton Roof

Race 9 Yarrow Valley Bluebell Trail Race





Race 8 Pinhaw Moor Trail Race
Ian is still winning

Wesham’s finest
Race 7 Astley Park Trail Race
Congratulations to Ian Hogg our first qualifier!

Race 6 Wray Caton Moor












Race 5 Rivington 10

Race 4 Wardle Skyline

Race 3 Trotter Trail Race

Race 2 Bleasdale Circuit

Race 1 Silverdale Circuit


Archives:
2022 – Off Road Final Standings
2021 – No standings due to Covid
2020 – No Standings due to Covid
2019 – Trail Championship & Fell Championship
2018 – Trail Championship only