11:25am Thursday 6th March 2003
By Gazette News Desk
FRESH impetus has been given to staging a world championship sports event in South Lakeland after organisers were about to "throw in the towel."
The Fell Running Association's uphill efforts to put on the prestigious World Mountain Running Trophy at Sedbergh in 2005 looked doomed to failure due to lack of support from funding bodies Sport England and UK Sport. They repeated their refusal to back any bid to stage the championships because fell running is not an Olympic or Commonwealth Games sport and did not have "sufficient strategic priority."
A crestfallen Dave Hodgson, who is financial controller for the event, that is expected to attract more than 5,000 athletes and spectators to the town, was on the point of calling it a day until receiving strong words of encouragement this week from the chairman designate of the soon-to-be-formed Cumbria Rural Regeneration Company.
The regeneration company has been set up with instructions from the North West Development Agency and Cumbria County Council to implement eight strategic objectives formulated to broaden the base of the rural economy following foot-and-mouth and one of those objectives is to promote recreation and tourism.
Charles Woodhouse, chairman designate of the regeneration company, that will start work in April, told The Westmorland Gazette he would do all within his power to encourage support for the world mountain running championships to be held in the Howgills.
He said the regeneration company might not be able to fund directly the £35,000 asked for by the Fell Running Association, but would be able to "open some doors" and "find the leverage" to unlock monies to put on the event, which has a £100,000 budget.
"I would think that we would want to encourage this bid and do all we can to help to get the event funded," said Mr Woodhouse, who is also a trustee of the UK Athletics Foundation and a personal friend of former Olympic athlete Dave Moorcroft, who is chief executive of UK Athletics.
"I would be very disappointed if this bid did not go ahead. It's a good bid. Fell running is strong in Cumbria and we ought to be supporting it. I think it's very disappointing that so far they have had some negative reaction."
Two years ago, the Fell Running Association had to shelve its bid to stage the championships at Sedbergh in 2003 because Sport England and UK Sport gave the same reasons for not supporting the event. And plans to stage the event at Sedbergh in 2001 were scuppered when the World Mountain Racing Association Council voted by 11 votes to 10 to put on the event in Italy.
Mr Hodgson said the championships would be centred on Sedbergh School, which would become an Olympic-style village for the athletes expected from more than 30 countries. He said the plan was to make the event a weekend festival of fell running and there would be an open race for non-international athletes.
Mr Hodgson, who lives in Leeds, said England would face competition to stage the event from New Zealand but was confident Sedbergh would win through. "I have been to 15 world mountain racing trophy events (they have been held recently in Malaysia, Austria, the Czech Republic and on Reunion Island) and nowhere have I been on courses as good as we have got in the Howgills," he said.
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