MARK Brown missed his chance of victory in the Colne 11 mile Multi-Terriain Race when he lost a shoe in the mud, but he was happy to shrug it off as a minor misfortune after running his best race for over a year.

The arm amputee has endured an injury nightmare since winning the silver medal over the marathon distance at Sydney in the Millennium Paralympics.

He suffered a foot injury during his marathon effort, and although it turned out to be a minor problem, it marked the start of his troubles.

Within weeks he had developed a stress fracture in the pelvic area, and coupled with associated ligament damage, it meant that last year was completely written off save a couple of premature and aborted returns.

While the Wesham 10K in November was his return to action, Colne was his first big test, and he passed it with flying colours.

With the Commonwealth Games concentrating on blind and wheelchair athletes, Manchester isn't an option, so his target for this year is the World Marathon Championship at Lille, France in July. The qualifying race is the Bath Half Marathon next month.

His main rival, Javier Conde from Spain who took the gold in Sydney has become a close friend, and Mark has just returned from a trip to stay and train with him at Basauri near Bilbao.

He has been invited out again in May to compete in a 3000m track race which takes place two days after his 40th birthday.

Meanwhile, the Colne race is gradually gaining a following after returning to the calendar two year ago.

Organised by Trawden AC with help from staff at Colne Leisure Centre, the field numbered 73, compared to just 45 last year.

It wasn't just a Clayton benefit either as runners from much further afield signed up. Two of them, Steve Littler of North Fylde and last year's winner Paul Muller set the pace with Clayton's Brown.

The hill up to the Herders at halfway proved decisive with Roger Brewster and Andy Black finally dropping away, and Brown losing touch just before the summit.

Brown all but caught up again as road gave way to track, but then the shoe came off and Littler and Muller were gone.

The North Fylde man took the race in 62:03, but Blackpool based Muller set a new over 40's record just six seconds behind.

Brown and Brewster crossed the line a minute down with the latter setting a new M45 best of 63:13.

Both records had previously been held by the late Roger Hargreaves and were set in 1991 and 1993.

Ted Orrell of Clayton broke his own M60 record as he placed 33rd in 79:24, and there were age group wins for Clayton's Jeff Pickup and Graham Murray.

The ladies title went to Mel Wilkinson Walsh while the next three home were class winners. Andrea Barraclough, Janet Chaplin and Christine Leathley won F35, F40 and F50 honours as Chorley Harrier Janet broke the Clayton monopoly.

Men: 1 Steve Littler (N Fylde) 62:03; 2 (1st M40) Paul Muller (Horwich) 62:09 record; 3 Mark Brown (CleM) 63:10; 4 (1st M45) Roger Brewster (CleM) 63:15 record; 5 Andrew Black (CleM) 64:50; 6 Steve Sweeney (Bowland FR) 65:25; 7 David Gregory (CleM) 66:42; 8 (2nd M45) Thornton Taylor (Ross) 67:05; 10 (3rd M40) Paul Brannon (CleM) 68:37; 11 John Wieczorek (Accrington RR) 68:50; 12 Neil Worswick (CleM) 69:32; 13 (3rd M45) Graham Cunliffe (CleM) 70:14; (M40) John Roche (CleM) 70:27; 15 Stephen Whittaker (CleM) 70:41; 16 (M45) Raymond Lee (CleM) 72:30; 17 (M45) John Chaplin (Chorley Harriers) 74:05; 18 Justin Edwards (Burnley) 74:20; 20 (M45) Keith Parkinson (Tod) 74:46; 21 (1st M50) Jeff Pickup (CleM) 74:57; 24 (M40) Richard Stott (Ross) 76:02; 28 (M45) Richard Bellaries (CleM) 77:32; 31 (M45) Stephen White (CleM) 78:26; 33 (1st M60) Ted Orrell (CleM) 79:29 record; 38 (1st M55) Graham Murray (CleM) 82:41; 39 (2nd M60) Ross Jaques (CleM) 83:12; 40 (2nd M50) Dave Hammer (Blackburn RR) 84:19; 41 (3rd M50) Robert Hirst (CleM) 86:20; 48 (2nd M55) Tom Targett (CleM) 89:32; 54 (3rd M55) Doug Munroe (CleM) 94:25

Women: 1 (37th overall) Mel Wilkinson-Walsh (CleM) 82:04; 2 (47th/1st F35) Andrea Barraclough (CleM) 89:18; 3 (49th/1st F40) Janet Chaplin (Chorley Harriers) 89:52; 4 (56th/1st F50) Christine Leathley (CleM) 96:09; 5 (58th/2nd F35) Gill Craske (Accrington RR); 7 (63rd/3rd F35) Marie Alcroft (Chorley Harriers) 100:11; 8 (64th/F35) Gillian White (Trawden) 100:27