A Great Start to the 24/25 Essex XC League Season.

In the first of the Essex Cross Country League season staged in the Hainault Forest, Chigwell. It was our  senior women`s team which excelled as they put their scoring four inside the top ten finishers. Rebecca Luxton led the team home with her first place with Megan Williams following her through in second place. With Rachel Broome 7th and Lucy Nuttall 10th this brought a total score of 20 which put them comfortably ahead of Havering and Orion Harriers. Sophie McCall, like Lucy still in the under 20 age group, placed 15th. Rebecca`s performance also set the veterans team to success with Wendy King, first over 50, and Laura Durn 26th the others scoring whilst Anne Nuttall was well placed in reserve being 27th

The senior men`s race also brought another win for Chelmsford. After relegation last term it looks promising that there will be a quick return from division two. One must point out that this success was despite having only one senior turning out with Zack Bridgeland placing fourth. Now it was the veterans completing the task with Will Parrott 30th, Peter Waite 42nd, Lee Martin 64th, Peter Tullett 115th and Mick Bridgeland 169th from the field of 230 finishers.

There was also a win for the under 17 men with in form Jacob Hurrell taking pole position with Austin Kelly 7th and Joshua Eida 9th completing the scoring trio whilst Thomas Carter 12th and Ben Smith 13th were also in the running.

For the under 15 boys it was to be third place behind Basildon and Brentwood. Jacob Parrott had led this team with his third place with Joe Delaney 8th, Luke Webb 21st and Daniel Pollard 33rd.  For the under 13 boys it was to be a sixth place as they were led home by Joshua Dalton 3rd with Thomas Burgoyne 10th, Jake Boarer19th and Charlie Jackson 31st.

With this meeting clashing again with the National relays the Chelmsford team`s were lacking support although such is the depth of under 15`s they were still to take second place behind Brentwood. Here Francesca Phillips placed 3rd with Isabella Eida right behind her. Emma Pickering placed 10th with Stephanie Smith 21st. Emma Cox our only under 17 placed 5th in that age group whilst we had to miss out in the under 13`s due to those races at Birmingham,

Although not part of the league races are organized for under 11 year and Chelmsford were well represented. In the boys result Jacob Smithyes finished in 4th place with Arthur Cooke hard on his heels. Toby Hall 12th, Henry Ball 16th all placed in the top half of the field.  Leila  Robinson had a great race to finish second with Bella Kehoe 4th,  Hannah Hogben 6th,  Bailey Kehoe 30th and Olivia Bilby 36th.

Report written by Roy Meadowcroft       

90th Birthday Medals at the National Road Relays.

October  5th,  Chelmsford Athletic Club`s 90th `Birthday`  did this go unnoticed?

Well the junior girls teams certainly made a gallant attempt to give a golden glow to the occasion. Most notably the under 15 year teams in the English Road Relay championships in Birmingham`s   Sutton Park. Oh so nearly gold as Ezrah Harrold with 13m 11s on the opening lap came through in second place, just one second down on the leader. Incidentally these were to prove the fastest laps throughout the race contested by by the 67 teams lining up on the starting line. Following home came Ava King with 13m 30s - so two teams in the top three. Lap two and Aldershot moved into second place with Chelmsford`s two teams following them through via Erin Kelly (13m 44s) and Lily Sanford (14m 07s). Now Aldershot took the lead to win in 40m 07s but Jorga March with 5th best time of the race bringing CAC home in 40m 14s, or just seven seconds down. One can see from times that had Ava King`s time had been in the `A` team there could have been gold to celebrate          that 90th year. Great solid times found the `B`team holding onto 4th place with Hetty Harrison on 14m 35s.

Good showing in the under 13 and under 17 year age groups, in the former Isla Kehoe timed at 14m 30s – tenth best in the race came through in fifth place, Beatrix Cooke 15m 07s placed sixth and Orla Martin on 16m 02s gave a final creditable position for a national event with eighth placing. In the under 17`s Lottie Wilkin with 13m 43s came through in sixth spot - a position retained by Sienna Shipton (14m 25s) whilst on the final stage Daisy Stollery with 13m 48s gave a final position of fifth.  

Report written by Roy Meadowcroft

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Many Medals for our Multi Eventers.

What surely should have been the last weekend of the summer season CAC had members involved with two Combined Events meetings - the English Schools Competition held at Stoke and the Eastern Counties Championship staged at Peterborough.

In the schools meeting Essex were to win both the junior and intermediate competitions and in these Jeremy Andersen placing ninth in the junior event helped Essex to a margin of 106 points over Kent. In the intermediate age group Daniel Brown was first of the Essex team with 8th place and Arseni Handzil completed the trio being 22nd and with a combined points total of 13079 clear of Cheshire by 406 points. Best individual placing by an Essex athlete came from the senior boys Decathlon with Sam Wright placing fourth. Unfortunate for Sam the high jump event in which he has a superior best of the season over his opponents resulting no doubt to the loss of a podium placing.

 In the junior girls the Essex team consisted of three Chelmsford members, Lily Hartman recently joining from Basildon placed 9th with Chelsea Clarke 12th and Alicija Yalaju 15th and their combined points tally fell just 63 short of Yorkshire who took the title. In the intermediate girls class Milana Thorpe in 8th place was leading Essex competitor with the team third behind Hampshire and Greater Manchester.

At Peterborough three medals were won. Harry Lee was the pick with gold in the under 17 men whilst Saya Saunders having personal bests at 75 metre hurdles and 800 metres was to pick up the silver medal in the under 15 girls event. At under 13`s Shindra Ayo-Adeyemo put in a pb with her shot putt and this aided to another personal best with a combined score of 2149 points and third place here AND a ranking of 13th in the UK.

Report written by Roy Meadowceoft