Colchester Harriers senior team travelled to Chelmsford for the second Southern Athletic League division 1 match of the season on Sunday.  They were competing against the host club who were joint top of the league and strong teams from both Crawley and Norwich.

The Harriers took several A string wins on the track with fine performances from Rebecca Jeggo 25.5s in the 200m, Stacey Eyres 2m 19.7s in the 800m, Sarah Stradling 17m 59.8s in the 5,000m and Heather Rose 67.3s in the 400m hurdles.  The men won the 400m, 800m and 3,000m A string races with fine performances from Connor Oliver 50.1s, Jake Young 1m 57.4s and Chris Sellens 9m 24.3s.

A string victories in the field events proved more difficult with Jade Morgan winning the triple jump with her best effort being measured at 11.27m whilst Philippa Davenall comfortably won the 4kg hammer competition with an excellent personal best throw of 54.17m.  Davenall is now ranked 4th in the UK in the under 20 women’s age group and in the top 20 overall.

There were B string track wins for Heather Rose with 26.5s in the 200m, Hannah Watson with 5m 14.6s in the 1,500m and Beth Francis 6m 18.1s in the 1,500m steeplechase.  For the men there were B string wins for Oscar Dawson 2m 01.5s in the 800m and Carwyn Jones 9m 26.9s in the 3,000m.

There were also B string wins in the javelin competitions for Jade Morgan and Tom Mitchell with throws of 30.89m and 44.92m respectively.  Paul Cooper threw 46.19m in the A string competition which was only good enough for third place.

Catherine Holdsworth produced fine performances to finish second behind Crawley’s international heptathlete Jo Roland in the A string shot and javelin competitions with best throws of 12.00m and 33.40m.  Holdsworth also finished second in the B string hammer competition with a best throw of 34.38m.  To round off a busy afternoon she cleared 1.50m in A string high jump finishing third on countback.

There were second places for Denise Morley in the B string 800m, Becky Cooke in the B string 5,000m, Ella Neale in the A string 1,500m steeplechase, Millie Belbin in the B string long and triple jump and Jade Morgan in the B string shot.  The 4 x 100m relay quartet of Courtney Bland, Rebecca Jeggo, Jade Morgan and Millie Belbin took a fine second place.

Robbie Smith grabbed second place in both B sting 400m hurdles and 3,000m steeplechase races.  Ben Argent took a fine second place in the B string 100m race, Paul Clifford was runner up in the B string 400m race whilst Jon Nears (A string) and Bobby Walker (B string) finished in second place in the 1500m race.  The hard working Matt Rose cleared 3.40m in the A string pole vault to finish in an excellent second place.

A good team effort resulted in third place for the Harriers on 176 points, ahead of City of Norwich with 122 points and behind Crawley on 205 points and match winners Chelmsford with 218 points.