I was at Darlington’s ‘Race for Life’ event on Sunday, the sun was shining, the runners were smiling and South Park was looking pristine.

Amongst the 4,000 participants were a number of runners from Cockfield, including my daughter Leanne. She’s been training quite hard in the last few months, and it all paid off when she came back in a time of 27 minuets. To be fair, it took her about 5 minuets to get past the start line, so it’s even more impressive for someone who only took up jogging about a year ago!

I was, to say the least, a very proud father, and Leanne managed to raise over £500 for Cancer Research.

Other runners from Cockfield included Joanne Wright, her sister Debbie and Debbie’s daughter Nicole. Sarah Proud was there with several girls from the youth club and five members of the late Pauline Bell's family, were running in memory of their mother. Well done to Clair Stephenson, who also took part.

CONGRATULATIONS to all the girls from Cockfield on such a splendid effort.

The good weather drew the crowds to South Park and the organisers hope to return there next year.

Holly Howey, the area events manager for Cancer Research UK said: “We couldn’t have asked for a better day.

It was absolutely brilliant.

“It’s a really emotional day, but it’s been a great family day out. This is the eighth time it’s been in Darlington.

We’ve got events all across the North-East, and we’ll just keep doing it.

Hopefully, if we achieve the target for all the North- East events, we’ll raise the £1.3m that we hope to achieve this year.”

If anyone would like a copy of any of these pictures, please e-mail me at…nigeldowson@yahoo.co.uk