ORGANISERS of York's Race For Life are urging more women to sign up for the annual fundraiser after it had to be postponed twice.

Downpours which drenched Knavesmire over the weekend meant the ground was too waterlogged to stage the race, which was to have taken place today.

Six-and-a-half thousand women were due to have taken part in today's event - which included an afternoon and an evening race.

Race For Life had already been postponed from its original date on June 27 because of last month's torrential rain.

As we reported yesterday, race organiser Cancer Research UK has now rescheduled York's Race for Life to its third date this year: August 26.

There will be two races on that day: one at 10.30am and the other at 2.30pm.

York's Race For Life co-ordinator Stuart Leslie said he hoped more women would now be able to take part in the morning event because it was taking place on a Sunday rather than a Wednesday.

Currently, 1,100 women are due to run at 10.30am on August 26, after they were automatically re-entered from today's afternoon event.

But Knavesmire has the capacity to accommodate 5,500 runners - so there is space for many more to sign up.

Stuart said: "It's a good opportunity for people who haven't been involved in Race For Life up to now, or if they've missed out, to sign up and take part.

"As the Wednesday afternoon race has now moved to a Sunday morning, there may be a lot of people who otherwise would have been working who are now able to take part. I'm hoping we'll get quite a few more.

"It's an unprecedented situation so we don't know what will happen.

"You can't legislate for the weather. We've given ourselves as good a chance as any by giving ourselves a lot of time and the racecourse time to dry out."

All women who were due to take part in today's evening race at Knavesmire have been re-entered into the 2.30pm event on August 26.

For further information or to sign up to the event, log on to www.raceforlife.org or call the hotline on 08705 134314.

For those runners who cannot make the rescheduled race, space has been made available at the Leeds Race for life at Temple Newsam Park, on July 28, at 4pm, or on July 29, at 2.30pm.