| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nationality | Scottish | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 5 September 1959 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country |  Scotland | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Long-distance running | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Event(s) | Fell running, mountain running | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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| Updated on 3 December 2014. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Colin Kerr Donnelly (born 5 September 1959 [1] ) is a Scottish runner who was the British fell running champion three times and finished second in the World Mountain Running Trophy.
Donnelly is a son of Raymond Donnelly, a sometime racing cyclist. Colin attended Eastwood High School, Newton Mearns and was a member of the Cambuslang Harriers. [2] He showed some talent as a youngster, winning the Galloway and Renfrewshire Schools under-19s cross country championships. His first hill race was at Ben Lomond in 1978. The following year, he won the Ben Nevis Race and in 1980 finished a close second in the Three Peaks Race. [3] He graduated in Arts from the University of Aberdeen. [2]
The peak of Donnelly's running career was in the late 1980s. In 1986 he had another victory at Ben Nevis in one of the fastest times ever recorded for the race. [4] He won the British Fell Running Championships three consecutive times from 1987 to 1989 [5] and in 1988, he won the Snowdon Race. [6]
Also in 1988, he set a record for the traverse of the Welsh 3000s with a time of 4:19 which stood until 2019 when it was beaten by Finlay Wild. [7] Donnelly has also won the Welsh 1000 m Peaks Race many times. [8]
Donnelly finished second in the short race at the World Mountain Running Trophy in 1989. [9] As a veteran, he won global titles at the World Masters Mountain Running Championships in the over-40 category in 2001 [10] and as an over-60 runner in 2019. [11]
He held the course record for the Buckden Pike Race from 1988 to 2022, [12] and still holds the Shelf Moor Race record, set in 1989. [13] He continued to win races as late as 2017, thirty-eight years after his first Ben Nevis win. [14]
He has completed the Bob Graham, Paddy Buckley and Ramsay Rounds, as well as the South Wales 2,000ers. [8]
Fell running, also sometimes known as hill running, is the sport of running and racing, off-road, over upland country where the gradient climbed is a significant component of the difficulty. The name arises from the origins of the English sport on the fells of northern Britain, especially those in the Lake District. It has elements of trail running, cross country and mountain running, but is also distinct from those disciplines.
Welsh 3000s are the 15 mountains in Wales with a height over 3,000 feet (914.4 m). Geographically they fall within three ranges, but close enough to make it possible to reach all 15 summits within 24 hours, a challenge known as the Welsh 3000s challenge. All 15 are classed as Furths by the Scottish Mountaineering Club, meeting the criteria for a Scottish Munro, and are on the official list of SMC Furths.
Andrew "Andi" Jones is an English athlete who specialises in road, cross country, and mountain/fell running, and has competed for England and Great Britain. In 2003, he finished fourth in the World Mountain Trophy in Alaska. Closer to home, he competes for Stockport Harriers. Although one of the UK's leading distance runners, Andi chooses to work full-time alongside his running career and was employed as head of Design and Technology at Falinge Park High School, Rochdale. In 2014, Jones emigrated to Qatar.
Angela Mudge is a Scottish champion hill runner and skyrunner. Despite being born with birth defects in both legs, and finding track athletics not to her liking, she discovered her sport while a postgraduate student in Scotland in the mid-1990s, and developed rapidly.
Robert Jebb is an English fell runner, skyrunner, and cyclo-cross rider. He has won the annual Three Peaks Cyclo-Cross in the Yorkshire Dales a record twelve times since 2000, is a four-time-winner of the Three Peaks Race in the same region and broke Catalan dominance in the Buff Skyrunner World Series when he became champion in 2005.
Kenny Stuart is a former fell and road runner from Threlkeld in the Lake District.
Ian Holmes is an English fell runner who was the national champion several times in the 1990s and 2000s and represented his country at the World Trophy and European Trophy.
Carol Greenwood is an English former runner who won the World Mountain Running Trophy and was twice a national fell running champion.
John Richard Wild is a male English former runner who competed in cross country, fell running, and the 3000m steeplechase.
Mark Croasdale is an English athlete who was a British fell running champion and competed in cross-country skiing at the Winter Olympics.
Gavin Bland is a British fell runner who was a British and English champion and represented his country at the World Mountain Running Trophy.
Mark Kinch is an English former runner who was a national fell running champion and represented his country at the World Mountain Running Trophy in the mid-1990s.
Victoria Wilkinson is an English runner and cyclo-cross rider who was a world mountain running champion at junior level and who has several times been a national fell running champion as a senior athlete.
Angela Brand-Barker is a British runner who was a national fell running champion and represented her country at the World Mountain Running Trophy.
Simon Roger Arthur Bailey is an English runner who has been a national fell running champion several times and who has represented his country at the World Mountain Running Trophy.
Finlay Wild is a Scottish runner and mountaineer who was a British fell running champion. He has won the Ben Nevis Race eleven times.
Mark Alan Rigby is a British runner who was a national hill running champion and who represented Scotland in the World Mountain Running Trophy.
Beverley Redfern is a British mountain runner who won the 1990 World Mountain Running Championships.
Philippa "Pippa" Maddams is a female British former mountain and fell runner who won the World Long Distance Mountain Running Challenge in 2011.
Pauline Stuart is a former pioneer female fell runner, being the first woman to win many of the classic fell races in the late 1970s and early 1980s, some as soon as they allowed women to enter.
