Colchester Harriers got the Essex League Season off with a bang at One Tree Hill on Saturday with a record turnout and some fine performances across the club’s senior and junior teams.

The senior women got their title defence off to a solid start helped by a remarkable display by Lizzie Wellsted, who led from the start and finished nearly 40 seconds ahead of what was a high-quality field to take a decisive victory.  Lizzie was backed up by fine runs from Holly Freegard (8^th), Margaret Deasy (26^th and 1^st V55) and Annette Oakman (32nd and 3^rd V50) as Colchester’s women ended the day in third place in Division One.

The men had no fewer than 24 finishers with Angus Claxton impressing on his debut to take a fine sixth position, with James Morley hot on his heels in tenth place.  Nate Filer finished twenty-second (2^nd V40), Cameron Humphries was twenty-sixth with Andy Jobling (45^th) and Jason Gunn (47^th) completing the scoring team as the men secured fourth place on the day.  Full results below.

For the juniors, in the U17 race Finley Greenleaf ran strongly to come home eighth, Caleb Lee was twenty-fourth and Jake Phillips thirtieth, Harrison Cumner finished twenty-third in the U15B race with Hayden Preston eighteenth on his debut in the U13B race.

Meanwhile Harriers had 2 representatives  in the Essex teams competing in the Eastern Intercounties 10K road race in Cambridge, with Adrian Mussett rolling back the years to clock a remarkable time of 30:39, finishing sixth overall on the day and missing out on the all-time UK age-group record by only four seconds, whilst Lydia Callan took a remarkable 2 minutes off her Personal Best (PB) as she ran 35:18 to finish seventh female and highest placed Essex runner.

Elsewhere Chris Pugh ran 2:56:43 (PB) at the Chelmsford Marathon to finish eleventh and go under 3 hours for the first time with Chris Edwards posting a fine 1:20:07 (PB) to take seventh position in the half-marathon whilst in Manchester Chris Stevenson also claimed a half-marathon PB as he finished in 1:27:23 (fourth V60). On the south coast Roanna Vickers ran a brilliant 59:37 (PB) to finish first non-elite female at the Great South Run with Rosie Wild, despite being troubled by a blister, posting 60:35 on her 10 mile debut.

Essex League XC Senior Results – One Tree Hill

Women (141 finishers) – 1. Lizzie Wellsted, 8. Holly Freegard, 26. Margaret Deasy (1^st V55), 32. Annette Oakman (3^rd V50), 37. Heather Rose, 39. Jennifer Lovelock, 41 Denise Morley, 48. Ellie Cumner.

Men (257 finishers) – 6. Angus Claxton, 10. James Morley, 22. Nate Filer, 26. Cameron Humphries, 45. Andrew Jobling, 47. Jason Gunn, 52. Dan Widdowson, 62. Allen Smalls (1^st V55), 66 Alex Elliot, 68. Colin Ridley (1^st V60), 75. Kevin Higgins, 79. Peter West, 80. Paul Spowage, 81 Dan King, 87 Barry Frost, 109. Paul Clifford, 130. Rob Smith, 149. Stuart Harris, 155. Matt Rose, 162. Dom King, 173. Dan Steptoe-Thompson, 176. Kev McAlinden, 185. Ian Rattray, 195. Mark Wellsted.