IT was one of the highlights of the racing calendar over weekend, with the Snowdonia Marathon Eryri.

This epic 26.2-mile race circumnavigating the Snowdon massif draws a big field, plenty of supporters on route and even gets its own show on S4C.

And for those of you thinking it’s just a marathon, well there’s a reason it gets billed as the one of the toughest road marathons, because there's a mammoth 2,749 feet of climbing.

For Alaw Evans, racing for the second year in a row, there was unfinished business.

Only 20 and Denbigh Harriers' youngest member, Alaw was back on the course with lessons learned from last year and a great summer of training and racing setting her up for another go at this great event.

Her fellow members all knew she’d smash it and smash it she did, finishing in 4-09.10.

At an average pace of 9.30, Alaw took over 38 minutes off her run there last year.

She was over the moon with her race and quite rightly so.

Also on the course and looking forward to seeing what he could do having raced there before, Huw Williams ran a fantastic race.

With the temperatures having dropped and even hailstones at times, he finishing in 4-21.35, which was a personal best of over 18 minutes.

David Jones was hoping to take to the start line, but he had to withdraw.

While the marathon distance wasn’t on the cards this time, David ran the Porth Eirias 10k instead, finishing in 25th position in 46.06.

Joe Welch is not a newcomer to running.

However, last weekend saw him race at a new distance... 5k.

Usually the entry distance for most runners, Joe’s first 5k took place in Scotland.

He took third place in Ruby’s 5k Road Race in the Kilmarnock Halloween Running Festival, finishing in a fantastic debut time of 17.37.

Parkruns over the weekend were full of personal bests and best time this year achievements, despite the colder weather.

The biggest turnout for the Harriers was at the new Bodelwyddan Castle parkrun, now in its 10th week and with a field of 67 on the course.

Six Harriers raced, with five achieving personal bests and all six took positions in the top 15.

David Baugh led the Harriers home in third, just nine seconds outside his best in 21.59.

Richard Debicki was placed fourth, taking a massive four minutes and 25 seconds off his pb to finish in 22.21.

This shows that his recent addition to the club is only to the benefit of the Harriers.

Tony Benton also smashed his personal best by two minutes and nine seconds, finishing ninth in 23.11.

The pbs continued as Katy Baugh finished 10th overall and the fourth lady in 23.26, a 33-second improvement.

Fifth lady Victoria Whitehead was 11th and 46 seconds faster than her previous best in 23.30.

Meanwhile, finishing in 15th spot, Duncan Jones claimed a personal best of 32 seconds in 24.16.

Vic Belshaw and Emma Collins headed over to Wepre for the second toughest parkrun in the UK.

Vic was sixth in 21.11, with Emma the first lady (17th overall) in 24.13.

Also running locally, Dawn Marshall and Andy Morris took part at Conwy, with both achieving season’s bests.

Dawn hoped to show further improvement as she continues to come back from injury and she was delighted with her time of 26.55.

This was her first sub-27 minutes time in two years.

Hoping for a sub-30 minutes time, Andy was equally delighted to finish in 28.46.

Joe Welch took things easy at Troon to cross the line in 28.22.