BRISTOL & West AC women again finished top regional team at the Midland Counties Four Stage Road Relay Championships.
Fifth place for the quartet of Kate Mactear, Natalie Bretherton, Annie Carroll and Elaina Gard was an honourable effort so they finished just 14 seconds off the podium and only one second behind Stoke.
And if you are looking carefully at the results then don’t be fooled that it could have been even better.
At first glance Liz Sanigar’s cracking time of 15:09 on stage three for the club’s B team – the eighth fastest overall time of the day – would have meant the A team contesting the silver medals with Wolverhampton & Bilston as she was over two minutes quicker than Gard.
But it seems you can’t believe everything you read.
Team boss Chris Elson has clarified the situation by explaining that an official sent off Sanigar early before the previous runner had finished thereby explaining her super quick time.
Nonetheless solid runs by Mactear, Bretherton, Carroll, who brought B&W into the medals on stage three with a super time of 15:51 to go second and then finally Gard delivered a very creditable fifth place.
Senior women: 1 Birchfield Harriers 1:00.48; 2 Wolverhampton & Bilston 1:02.44; 3 Coventy 1:04.01; 4 City of Stoke 1:04.14
5 Bristol & West AC 1:04.15 (Kate Mactear 15:38, Natalie Bretherton 15:42, Annie Carroll 15:41, Elaina Gard 17:14).
10 B&W B 1:06.51 (Lucy Wallace 16:42, Clare Jolliffe 17:05, Liz Sanigar 15:09, Danni Sinclair 17:56).
24 B&W C 1:11.22 (Alice Watson 18:20, Emma Jolliffe 18:11, Hannah Dyer 17:13, Anna Ford 17:38).