News

As with everything Covid, the 2021 EYAL league matches took on a new format this year; no finals were being chased and clubs were arranged into “localish” groupings.  It was therefore wonderful to see live athletics action back in Colchester, when on Sunday 12 September, Harriers hosted the second and last of the meets – welcoming teams from Norwich, Ipswich, Team Norfolk, North Suffolk and Colchester and Tendring. Despite athlete numbers being down on previous years, there was still plenty of stiff opposition in many events making for some exciting competition. This was... read more

Allen Smalls, Colchester Harriers’ Ultra-marathon specialist, once again showed his remarkable staying power as he tackled the UTS Snowdonia 100, one of the UK’s toughest trail events. Featuring over 23,000 feet of climbing, the 100Km course along technical mountain trails offers plenty of challenges, but Smalls was equal to them all completing the race in a remarkable time of 21 hours and 41 minutes to finish 23rd overall and 1st V50 in a competitive field of over two hundred top trail runners. Meanwhile, in the slightly more prosaic setting of Kew Gardens Paul Mingay continued... read more

Evergreen Colchester Harriers veteran Adrian Mussett showed that he retains a spring in his step by cruising to victory in the Great East 10K at King’s Lynn. Mussett came home to win over a minute ahead of his closest rival, breaking the tape in a remarkable time of 32:33, the seventh fastest time in his age group in the UK this year. Keeping it in the family, Anita Mussett also had a good day, clocking 49:12 to finish 7th in her age group. There were also a host of great performances by Colchester runners in other road races over the weekend. The Clacton Half Marathon saw Seb Eaton run... read more

Usually seen as an early season opportunity to gain qualification standards for national events, the pandemic delayed Essex County AA Track and Field Championships finally took place over the weekend of 31 July, 1st August.  Harriers Track and Field athletes did themselves proud amassing a total haul of 13 medals and one superb Championship Best Performance by Lyla Belshaw. An early start on Saturday morning for U15 Hammer thrower, Wyatt Larkins saw him ease through to the final where he had the opportunity of an extra three efforts.  Sadly a magnificent throw just over... read more

Colchester Harriers’ athletes are continuing to get back into the swing of racing with a host of excellent performances in events up and down the country. Starting close to home, the Felsted 10K is a well established race in the local calendar that always attracts a good field and this year’s race was no exception with 13 green vests amongst the 300 runners lining up at the start. Mark Howard was the first home for the club, battling very warm conditions to clock 39:13 and finish inside the top 20. Jack McGuire posted a promising time of 40:41 on debut and he was followed by Dan Cook... read more

National Successes for Happy Harriers Hammer Throwers! Having made the long trek up to Manchester on Friday 9th July, Josephine Larkins (SG Hammer) was eager to get started. This was her first English Schools Championships and unsurprisingly she was a little nervous but excited to represent Essex.  As the penultimate athlete to throw this allowed her to size up her fellow competitors. After a No Throw on her first attempt due to nerves, Josephine threw 42.00m on her 3rd attempt, leaving her in 7th place going into the final. Unable to increase this with a further 3 throws,  she... read more

Colchester Harriers’ athletes figured prominently as the county’s best athletes gathered at the Chelmsford Athletics Stadium for the 2021 Essex 5000m championships on Wednesday evening.. Despite having completed over 50 miles in a 24 hour race just three days previously super-girl Victoria Primmer (pictured) ran a perfectly judged race to come through the field and finish third in the Women’s event and so capture her first county medal, with club-mate Jennifer Lovelock taking sixth place. Not to be out-done, super-vet Paul Mingay took silver in the Men’s V50 event, the Kelvedon... read more

On Sunday 4 July, a small but enthusiastic contingent of Junior Harriers made the trip to Norwich for the first EYAL match since 2019. Amidst very changeable weather conditions it was delightful to come together once again as a club and support the young green vests as each and every one of them gave their all against stiff opposition. Stand out performance of the day came from Lyla Belshaw  who won her U15 girls 1500m race in superlative form to cross in 4.47.2 ahead of the field by over 12 seconds,  taking 5 seconds off her PB and with it smashing the Club Record by 4... read more

Colchester Harriers’ athletes enjoyed a busy weekend of competition as the events calendar slowly begins to return to something like normal. Leading the way a team of four Colchester ladies won the 24 hour small team category at the Suffolk Trail Festival, beating off several, larger all male teams in the process. Tracy English, Polly Mears, Victoria Primmer and Justine Sheekey completed a remarkable 35 laps of the 5 mile off-road course through Thetford Forest, beating their nearest rivals by a full 4 laps and in the process smashing the course record. Meanwhile four Harriers... read more

It has been a long awaited, busy time for athletes over the past two weekends with the age group European trials from Bedford followed by the Olympic trials from Manchester less than a week later. There was medal success for hammer thrower Oliver Graham at the age group competition. In his first year at the U23, Oliver recorded a personal best throw of 62.93 to secure silver. In her second year at U23, Rebecca Jeggo competed in both the 100m and 200m. In the final of the 100m on the Saturday she separated two of her England relay teammates to finish 5th, recording a time of... read more