Harriers in action all over the world…. with wins in Essex, Norfolk, West Midlands, Merseyside and even Australia!

Colchester Harriers continued their defence of the Ellisons Cross-country League title with a convincing victory in the second race of the season in Colchester.  Spring-like sunshine at Hilly Fields saw Harriers take the first 3 positions in the Men’s race with Angus Holford first home, closely followed by Ram Osman and Edward Mitchell.  The winning trio were well backed up by Chris Sellens 5th, Andrew Jobling 14th, Cameron Humphries 16th, James Wright 18th and new boy Dan Widdowson who completed the scoring team in 20th place.  The green vests had another eight men finish in the top forty, testament to the club’s strength in depth.

The women’s team had an excellent day as well, with Denise Morley taking 5th a resurgent Becky Cooke 8th, Jordi Moat 10th, Alexandra Hennessey 11th with Andrea James, making a return to competitive action, in an encouraging 12th place. Images courtesy of Helen Taczynski and John Hyland.

Altogether a remarkable 45 Harriers took part in the senior event, which saw the club extend their advantage over Ipswich Jaffa at the top of Pool A to 2 points with a third of the season now completed.

In the Juniors event the girls finished first overall, repeating the feat of the senior men by capturing the top 3 places – Milly Presland continuing her impressive form to take victory, with under 15 Alexandra Bell-Cobbold finishing second and Madeleine Claydon bagging third.  The Boys provided strong support, finishing second in their event with Thomas Colsell, Luke Orrin and Charlie Wilder all claiming top ten positions.  Harriers now lie in second place after the first two races, just 2 points behind CATs.

In road racing Kevin Stevens was running the streets of the Big Apple, representing the club in the New York Marathon, and finishing in 3:50:03.  Back in the UK John Hennington continued his return from injury with an encouraging run of 41:45 in the undulating Billericay 10K, finishing in the top 50 in a race attracting over 600 runners, whilst Adrian Frost clocked 53:57.

In Parkrun action. 14 Harriers ran at Castle park, with Richard Heath (18:53), Simon Ford (19:40) and Rob Cronshaw (19:48) all going under 20 minutes to be among the first 10 finishers.  Across town at Highwoods it was the juniors who lead the way with Milly Presland first female finisher on the tough, off-road course in 22:12 and Thomas Colsell 2nd male home in a PB of 20:06.  Will Radley continued his return from injury with 18:46 at Chelmsford and George Mann was second at Great Cornard in 19:29.

Elsewhere in the UK Danny Millward finished first at Babbs Mill, Birmingham, with a time of 17:59 with dad Richard third home in 20:44 whilst other first finishers were Gavin Scanlon (18:39) at Swaffham and Mark McKeown (18:11) at Birkenhead.  Fran Norris continued her birthday celebrations setting a new age group record of 24:11 and finishing 2nd female overall at Dolgellau where Dave Wright was 4th overall, whilst Fergus Crouch was 3rd at Norwich in 18:21.

There was plenty of parkrun activity outside the UK too – with Kieran Callaghan running 24:33 at Deerpark Forest, Virginia, Ireland and Graham Langford clocking 21:01 to finish 5th at Rouen, France.  Tourist of the Week award however goes to Daniel King who was first to finish at Rosebud, Melbourne Australia in a time of 17:30.

Three junior Harriers took part in the second Sportshall competition of the season at Chelmsford on Sunday. Star on the day was Florence Clark who won the under 11 girls standing long jump with three jumps all measured at 2 metres or more, her winning jump being 2.06m. Florence was the only girl in the competition to exceed 2 metres. Florence also won the vertical jump with her best effort measured at 54cm, 8cm higher than the runner up. In the target throw Florence scored 11 points to finish equal second. To round off a great day Florence won her heat of the two lap race in 25.0s, the fourth quickest time in her age category.

The Taylor sisters, Amelie (under 13) and Megan (under 15), were also competing for the Harriers. Amelie was pleased with 5.91m and third place in the standing long jump and with 49cm and fourth place in the vertical jump. Amelie clocked 56.8s for third place in her heat of the four lap race. In the field events Megan’s had a win, a second place and a third place. winning the speed bounce with 74 in 30 seconds. Megan was runner up in the vertical jump, her best jump being measured at 55cm and was third in the standing long jump, her final jump being 2.06m. In the 4 lap race Megan was third in her heat in 52.1s.

The next round of the Essex Athletics Network Sportshall event takes place at Chelmsford on Saturday 7th December starting at 1pm. Full details can be found at https://www.eventbrite.com/o/essex-athletic-network

The start of the senior's race

Becky Cooke on her way to a top 10 finish at Hilly Fields

Dancing Richard??

Denise Morley leads the ladies home in 5th.

Angus 1st and Ram 2nd

The seniors celebrating another win.

The start of the junior's race

There were some great performances from our boys and girls

Some of our juniors who ran on Sunday