Black Country Road Race hailed a success - PICTURES and VIDEO

It signalled the start of the Black Country Festival and was split into three different events.

There were 5k and 10k races together with a family fun run and walk.

Both races started and finished in the centre of Halesowen and the winner of the 5K was James Thie from Cardiff while the first woman home was Sophie Falshaw.

Among the others who took part was Wolverhampton teacher Robin Fearn, aged 44, his wife Kay and their 12-year-old son Oliver.

Robin, who works at East Park Academy and lives in Kidderminster, said: "We started running towards the end of last year and had been looking for an opportunity to do it for real.

"I did not know Halesowen ha so many hills so it was nice to get to the end. We tried to stay together and had a great feeling of achievement at the finish. Now I think we have all got the running bug."

Dave Norman, aged 47, who works for an insurance company and lives in Penn, came second in his age group in the 10k with a time of 39 minutes.

He took part with fellow Dudley Kingswinford running club members Andy Weaver, 56, from Wombourne and Flora Bianco of Kinver.

Dave, who was running his fourth event in the past three weeks, has represented the club in the national cross country championship and completed the London Marathon four times.

He said: "There is a lot of mileage on the clock. It was a tough course and enjoyable race. There was good support through the town and I was high fiving the kids as I went by."

This was the sixth year of the annual event which started as a fun run and is organised by Halesowen and Rowley Regis Rotary club. It was the brainchild of one of their members, Alan Bowler, and has already raised over £100,000 for charity.

The 10k race was added in 2013 with the 5k appearing on the agenda for the first time this year. "It is becoming more popular by the year."