Rob Jebb and Sharon Taylor
Lakeland Runners In Yorkshire VestsBy Bill Smith (Photos © Bill Smith & Solmar)
On Saturday, August 25, 2001, Rob Jebb and his girlfriend Sharon Taylor, both members of Bingley Harriers, moved house from Airedale in West Yorkshire to Burneside, near Kendal. The following day they achieved a unique “double” by winning the male and female guides races at Grasmere Sports.
Rob, who was then 26, had also triumphed there the previous year, when Sharon was placed 3 rd on her guides race debut at the age of 21. Not long afterwards, they moved house again to the neighbouring village of Staveley, where they still live.
Rob, who works as a BT engineer at Windermere, was influenced in his choice of sport by his father, Pete, a rock climber and fell runner. Rob failed to achieve any success as a junior, however, but persevered to eventually gain his first victories in 1995, aged 20, in two Yorkshire events. One was a Keighley Hill Runners’ Winter League race at Goose Eye, the other at Halton Gill Sports, where he set a new course record after cycling 40 miles to the event, and then cycling 40 miles back home afterwards.
However, Rob had also been gaining valuable experience in the longer, more arduous races like the Ben Nevis (19th), Bens of Jura (6th), Glen Rosa Horseshoe (5th), and the Lakeland classics, Langdale Horseshoe (5th) and Duddon (6th). “I first ran the Ben Nevis in 1992 as an under-aged 18-year-old’, says Rob, ‘having been inspired to enter by watching my Father and Ian Holmes perform in it.”
His third victory came in the Loughrigg fell race at Ambleside in 1996, during which season he also gained a splendid 3rd place in both the Ben Nevis and Burnsall races, and an equally praiseworthy 5th position in both the long, rough Wasdale and Langdale events. All these results proved that Rob was becoming a skilled performer over all types of terrain and distance. And while he had initially excelled as a climber, he was now continually honing his descending skills.
Such was his progression that by 1998 he was able to command 6 th position in the annual British Fell Running Championship and 3rd in the English, both operated by the (amateur) Fell Runners Association. Further improvement evolved the following year with 2nd place in the British and another 3 rd in the English, though the Millenium Year saw a slide back to 6th in the British and 4 th in the English. “I believe I slipped back in the championships,” says Rob, “as progressing from being a not-very-good runner to gaining selection for England in international races meant that I couldn’t say ‘No’ to invitations to compete abroad. It was all new to me, so I raced too much and tired myself out. I don’t regret it, though, as I went to some great races and it was good experience for me.”
A True Champion
During the Foot and Mouth outbreak of 2001, Rob’s racing season was severely curtailed, though he and Sharon did manage to achieve double victories in the Glen Rosa Horseshoe (Isle of Arran), Up and Down the Old Man (Coniston) and, as previously noted, the Grasmere Guides Race. The following year, Rob tied with his clubmate Ian Holmes for 2nd place in the British Championship and yet again was placed 3rd in the English.
In 2003, he at last fulfilled his potential by winning the British title outright and coming a very close 2nd to Ian Holmes in the English. His chances for a championship “double” had hinged on the final race of the English competition, the Langdale Horseshoe. He either had to win the event outright or else finish three places ahead of Ian.
Though holding a narrow lead at the last summit, Pike O’Blisco, he lost out to the superior descending skills of Holmes and the Thirlmere shepherd, Gavin Bland – both former champions themselves, incidentally.
Another ambition was realised that season, when he achieved the first of his three wins in the Ben Nevis Race, also triumphing in the Lakeland Classics championship which covers the Wasdale, Ennerdale, Duddon, Borrowdale, Langdale and Three Shires races. In 2004, he was placed 3rd in the British and 4th in the English championships, but then dropped back to 5th in the 2005 English, while not contesting the British. He did, however, win that year’s World Sky Running Championship, and last season scored a terrific double victory in the British and English championships – a true champion indeed.
Rob’s early idols at Bingley Harriers were Ian Ferguson, Bob Whitfield and Andy Peace, while in more recent years he has developed great respect and admiration for Ian Holmes, holder of four British and five English championship titles, as well as being last year’s Over 40’s veteran champion in both competitions. Ian has occasionally advised Rob on racing and training.
As a racing cyclist, Rob has enjoyed considerable success in both road and cyclo-cross events, perhaps his greatest achievement in this discipline being his six consecutive victories in Yorkshire’s Three Peaks Cyclo-Cross, 2001- 06, while in April this year he completed a hat-trick of wins in the Three Peaks Fell Race. He cycles to and from work in Windermere, and in the evening would then run 8/10 miles, usually on Potter Fell or the higher Kentmere tops.
Since his second Guides Race victory at Grasmere in 2001, Rob has triumphed there on five more occasions, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008, and he and Sharon use the event as preparation for the following Saturday's Ben Nevis Race. (Page 2)
