Chris Beesley spent his 67th birthday running the Yorkshire Three Peaks- in just over four hours.

Along with one of his daughters, Rebecca Day, and four friends, Fiona Protheroe, Helen Greenep, Ruth Maxwel, and Sharon Hudson, together with Helen’s dog, Ruby, he has raised £1,690 towards the cost of bringing a Syrian refugee family to live in Settle.

With reduced light and potentially bad weather an issue, the runners chose a 16-mile route - several miles shorter than the traditional Three Peaks route of 24 miles.

And, instead of setting off from the more usual Horton-in-Ribblesdale, they started from the far side of Ingleton, heading first to Whernside, the tallest of the peaks, then Ingleborough, and finally, to Penyghent.

They set off at 8.50am on Friday, Chris’s birthday, and finished at Dale Head with the snow falling at 1.55pm.

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The overall time was five hours and five minutes, but with two refreshment stops and photo opportunities at the summits - to prove they had done all three peaks - their actual running time was four hours and 16 minutes, well within Chris’s target time of between four and five hours.

Chris, from Settle, who together with his colleagues is an experienced fell runner, said the worst part of the run was the first mile.

“It was bitterly cold when we set off. Whernside was in shadow and the way up was so cold that our jaws hurt; but after the first mile, our bodies warmed up,” he said.

As experienced fell runners, they all knew to avoid the potentially slippy and treacherous rocks and slabs on the descents, and experienced no problems at all - even the weather stayed fine on the day, although there was snow on the summits, and fresh snow started to fall towards the end of the run.