TWO courageous Scouts are celebrating after beating more than 1,000 other children in a race across the Cheshire countryside.

Jacob and Issac McClellen, from the 1st St Chads Scouts, won the Cheshire Hike competition in which they had to fend for themselves in often difficult circumstances.

The race started in Holmes Chapel and finished in Poynton, near Macclesfield, and the boys spent two days finding their way to various checkpoints along the way. Scout leader Alan Buckley is delighted with the boys' success.

He said: "We have never had any of our boys win an event like this before so it is extremely pleasing. It was a difficult course and they did extremely well to complete it and to win it was brilliant. They came first in mid Cheshire and fifth in Cheshire overall so it was a great effort.

"They are brothers and they had to work as a team to find their way along the hike and I think it was a great achievement."

Jacob, 13, and Isaac, 11, had to spend the night fending for themselves in a field as part of the challenge and Alan believes their training at the Scout group was essential.

He said: "We teach them an awful lot here and it is nice to see them putting it to some use.

"We teach them skills like map reading and cooking so these things were an important part of the hike. But these skills aren't just used in situations like that because they can be transferred into other parts of life.

"I think we are a successful Scout group and the boys' success is a reflection of that."