News

Colchester Harriers romped to victory in the Eillisons Cross Country League, wrapping up both the senior and junior titles with a barnstorming performance in the final fixture of the season in Hadleigh.  Colchester have dominated the senior competition all season and it was business as usual at Hadleigh with Chris Sellens, Nate Filer, Dan Widdowson, Dan King, Paul Rodgers, Tom Cresswell, Jon Nears and Thomas Palmer finishing in the top 14 for the men and Aiko Hennington, Kat Rigby, Denise Morley and Ellie Mayne all featuring in the top 10 of the women’s race. Alexandra Hennessey backed... read more

On Sunday 1st March, Heather Rose and Paul Mingay represented Colchester Harriers as part of the Eastern Masters Track and Field team at the England Masters Inter Area Indoor Track and Field Challenge. Held at Lee Valley Athletic Centre, Rose achieved a PB in the W35 60m. Despite a poor start which forced her to play catch-up, she gained ground to claim a good third place in a time of 8.35s. Drawn in the inside lane for the 200m, she negotiated the tight bends for another good third place with a season's best time of 27.32s ,which ranks her third in the UK for her category. Later, she... read more

This year’s Essex 20 Mile Road Race Championships saw a string of good performances from Harriers runners on a sunny, if breezy morning in Rochford.  Dean Williamson led the way on his debut over the distance, clocking 1:54:55 to finish eleventh overall and fifth in the Essex standings, combining with Mark McKeown (1:59:06) and Andrew Jobling (2:03:09) to take the bronze team medal.  Nate Filer continued his return to competition with 2:05:10, Paul Rodgers ran 2:12:16 and the evergreen Colin Ridley took silver in the V55 category with his time of 2:13:23.  Matt Davey was... read more

Report by Paul Dellar and Chris Akehurst Whilst the wind still blew and the rain still fell the weather did finally loosen its grip sufficiently to allow a full weekend of running for the Harriers’ mighty green army. Top of the bill at a muddy Ardleigh were the efforts of our men’s and women’s cross-country teams in the fourth Ellison's League fixture of the season.  The men had no less than eight runners feature in the top 14 – with Ramadan Osman storming to victory with Chris Sellens second, Daniel King fifth, Dan Widdowson sixth, Nate Filer an impressive seventh on his... read more

A busy weekend of national indoor athletic championships culminated in a superb senior bronze medal for Harrier sprinter Rebecca Jeggo, competing in her third British Indoor Championships. Having taken the long trip to Glasgow, her weekend of competition started on Saturday 22 February with a rare 60m outing.  With the Championships not acting as trials for World Indoors this year, competitor numbers were considerably down on last year. However, a third-place finish in 7.78s was good enough to gain her a slot in her first ever British Championship final, where she ran a PB of... read more

Another quiet weekend for local athletics with Storm Dennis the culprit on this occasion, putting paid to the final Essex League Cross-Country fixture of the season at Great Notley Park, and with it Colchester Harriers’ hopes of challenging for a league title win in the competition this season. With no slot available for the fixture to be re-arranged Harriers finished in second place in the Senior Women’s Division 1 and in third place in Division 1 for the Senior Men.  A number of Harriers did see success in the individual award categories with Milly Presland taking third place in the... read more

The British University and Colleges Sports, (BUCS), has been at the forefront of university sport for over 100 years. Taking place at the English Institute of Sport (EIS) in Sheffield from the 14th to 16th February 2020 the indoor Athletics Championships  is one of the biggest gatherings of Student athletes in the UK. On the first day of competition and making his debut at the indoor championships, Charlie Dobson, representing Loughborough University, competed in the men’s 60m. Drawn in heat number eight of twelve, he eased through round one, closing down after just thirty metres,... read more

Colchester Harriers’ runners braved the wind and the rain to fill five of the top seven positions at The Lamarsh Lionheart 5 mile trail race, the only race to survive as Storm Caira played havoc with Sunday’s local race programme.  Malcolm Statham was first home for the club and second overall as he came across the line in 41:05, just ahead of Douglas O’Neill who ran 42:37 to take third.  Richard Flutter clocked 44:26 to finish fifth, Simon Smith posted 44:31 for sixth whilst Debbie Cattermole ran 44:34 to finish second female and seventh overall.  Rachel Rodgers also... read more

Essex County and Eastern AA Indoor Championships Lee Valley 8th & 9th February 2020 This year’s indoor championships saw plenty of action from Harriers Track and Field athletes with two awarded as County Champions and others gaining some assuring PB’s. One of the club’s youngest competitors to earn recognition was Florence Clark who having already competed in Sportshall Athletics for Essex this winter, was keen to try out three events before taking on her first pentathlon later in the Spring.  A best leap of 3.94m was enough to secure her an Essex Silver (Eastern... read more

Report written by Paul Dellar The Harriers were well represented at the big local road race of the weekend with 22 runners among the 700 lining up on the start line of the Great Bentley Half Marathon.  Mark McKeown was first home for the club on a blustery, grey morning, running 1:16:46 to finish in 17th position and just edge out team-mate Jason Gunn who finished just one place behind with the same time.  Andrew Jobling was next to come across the line, posting 1:17:49, Dan Widdowson clocked 1:18:31 whilst Colin Ridley was first V55 home in a sprightly 1:21:05.  Jon Nears... read more