Billy Pinder adopted the role of “Blistering Billy” as the Skipton Athletics Club starlet surged to a record-breaking conquest at Patterdale in the Lake District.

Suffering from severe blisters exacerbated through training over bone-dry local landscapes, Pinder had nonetheless managed to piece together sufficient hard graft in advance of last Sunday’s under-18 championship race to enable him to show a clean pair of heels to some predictably tough opposition on the arduous 1,000-foot climb from Ullswater Country Fair, where he triumphed in a new record of 10min 37sec.

This bettered the previous best mark by nine seconds.

His outstanding effort also extended a truly remarkable record of fell championship success for Skipton Athletics Club, whose members – all of whom have emer-ged through their ranks – have now won collectively no fewer than 16 English or British titles in the past 15 years.

Alas, not for the first time, Skipton’s great joy has been tempered by yet another unfortunate episode amid a seemingly endless sequence of bad luck which has beguiled some of their promising young athletes.

The latest casualty is Nicole Farrier, who only recently was one of a Skipton trio who figured prominently for the North Yorkshire team in the United Kingdom Sportshall Athletics Championships.

She had been due for further representative honours in schools athletics over 800 metres during last midweek, but instead found herself in hospital, wired up, plated up and – understandably – fed up, after sustaining a badly-broken leg at football.

Inspiration for a fightback though, is all around, not least from clubmate Reb-ecca Lambson – more than a year out through illness – who has since returned with a vengeance and, after starring for England on the fells, has concentrated on the track.

Her latest fine performance was a top-ten finish – ninth in 10:01:02 in the under-20 women’s final over 3,000 metres, in the UK Championships at Bedford.

Also happily back in full flow following misfortune is James Mountain, who had led Skipton’s under-20 men’s team to medal success in the North of England Cross-Country Championships in late January before being knocked off his bike soon after by a way-ward motorist.

He too was left with a tough challenge to return to full fitness, but confirmation of his successful fight-back was recently franked through him winning the top under-20 award in the Helvellyn Race.

ROGER INGHAM

Last weekend, Victoria and Mary Wilkinson (Bingley Harriers) were the leading Britons at the European Mountain Running Championships in Sapareva Banya, Bulgaria. This was the first time both had run for Great Britain in the same team since 2006, and their performances demonstrated that when fit and healthy, they are among the best in Europe.

Victoria was tenth, Mary 14th and the GB team fifth.