Medal Success at a Sweltering Southern Championships.

It's congratulations to four of our members in coming up with gold winning performances in the South of England championships staged at the Melbourne Park Stadium.

Over 800 metres Jacob Hurrell took the under 20 men title with a time of 1m 51.68s thus confirming his Essex win gained in May. For Edward Hughes in the 400m hurdles this was his first championship race of the season, and his success came with a clocking of 54.71s - just outside his best of 54.54s from a Birmingham University meeting

At under 15 level Erin Kelly came up with a run some 23 seconds faster than when placing third in the Essex 3000 metres and now with 10m 14.34s there was the reward of first place. Away from the track and Alastair Brown keeps coming up with winning performances in championship events in the shot putt having already taken the South and England indoor titles. This time an effort of 17.04m was only marginally outside his best of 17.08m.

It was in the field events seeing three silver medals being won, Oliver Graham in the hammer throw for senior men reached 57.64m whilst in the women's event Helene Ingvaldsen also placed second with 58.41m. This later event also gave Charlotte Graham achieving a pb. With an effort of 42.26m

To the high jump and here another pb as Charlie Pyner (U20) cleared 1.95m. On the track Bradley Reed came away with second spot from the senior 110m hurdles whilst in the under 20`s 1500 metres Gregory Martin placed second in 3m56.71s with Harry Wright with a pb of 3m 58.13s finished in fifth place. Finally, there were two bronze medals - Sam Wright in the under 20 long jump with 6.94 metres and veteran Paul Grange third in the senior 800m in 1m 55.40s where he headed Luke Oliver and Jacob Alexander also going under the two minute time. Not all good performances come up in the top three places for Fred Ferman in the under 15`s 3000m brought his pb down to 9m 36.38s when placing fifth,  Hetty Harrison fourth in the under 17`s steeple-chase improved her time to 5m 30.43s and Charlotte Oliver who we mention above reached 38.65m with the discus notched up her second pb. Another to achieve two personal bests was Abigail Mcelroy with fourth place in the under 20`s 200 metres in 26.01s and then to the triple jump reaching 10.92 metres. Other athletes carrying our colours here saw Lily Frost 4th in the discus, under 20`s with 28.71s, Sienna Shipton 5th over 800m in 2m 18.98s and James Becker going through heats, semi-finals in both sprints. For the under 17`s 3000 metres Austin Kelly in seventh place with 9m 17.61s headed our Max Chivers, Daniel Pollard and Jacob Parrott.

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Report written by Roy Meadowcroft

CAC Turn Things Around for a Win at Match 2 of the SAL.

For our second Southern League fixture of the campaign, we were able to enjoy a home meeting and with an improved turn out it brought about a change of fortune compared to match one at Basingstoke. Here we gained a good win with 288 points to head Harrow on 276, Medway 234, Brighton 220, Bracknell 173 and Reading 153 - a result which shoots CAC up to eighth place in the table.

From the sprints we saw a fine double success for James Becker winning the 100m with a season’s best of 10.9s and later taking the 200m with a personal best of 23.00s.  However, it was to the middle distance that we saw very nearly complete domination. Over the 800m veteran Paul Grange finished in second spot with 1m 56.3s following which Thomas Woodward won the `B` string in 1m 58.4s. For the increase in distance to 1500m and now maximum points were claimed via Joseph Grange, 4m 00.4s and William Nuttall, 4m 01.3s, whilst Finn Rattray as a non-scorer was hard on their heels with 4m 06.2s. In the 3000m there was a rare performance of THREE pb`s with Finn Rattray clocking 8m 37.7s, William Nuttall 8m 37.9s and Sam Plummer 8m 44.2s. Of course, this had brought full points whilst a further three runners were out there as back up`s. Another event bringing pb`s was the 400m hurdles via Marcus Fazackerley and William Nuttall. To the field events and in the pole vault Jack Hughes cleared a pb of 4.20m for second place and Stephen Adesina won the `B` with 3.25m the throws brought many points with a full house from the shot putt via Alastair Brown (14.75m) and Oliver Graham (12.00m). Oliver was also second in the hammer (57.06m) with Yasha Bobash winning the`B` with 48.58. It was good to see several younger members competing at this level for the first time and they can feel very pleased with their performances. Matilda Hewitt placed second in both shot and discus with efforts of 11.55m and 37.86m - both pb`s. Senior Helene Ingravelsen won the `B`string shot with 11.49m whilst winning the hammer with 58.90m and it was full points here with the support of Charlotte Graham on 39.95m Under 17 Amelie Scott took first place in the long jump whilst it was pleasing to see the return of Lily Parris in her first appearance on a UK track since 2023 although many races in the USA show good performance as she competed for her Princeton University and here she came up with a win in the 400 metre hurdles. Although not aware of the make-up of the team the 4 x 400 relay squad found success in 3m 53.9s. There were other solid performances by our young athletes including Lucy Nuttall and Katie Cox who each set pb`s in the 15000 metres but let`s go to other end of the spectrum with veteran Rebecca Quinlan winning the 3000 metres with over 50 Anna Nuttall taking second place in the `B` string. At long last we were seen to be competing in the women's pole vault AND within the 60 year age category. Well done Clare St.John-Coleman. Under 17 year old Alicja Yalaju covered three events and with Erin Minton-Branfoot four events they gleaned many points to bolster our score. Pity was we could this time find no 100m hurdlers and only one triple jumper.

Report written by Roy Meadowcroft 

Mile Success on Mid Summers Day.

The `Miles of Miles` staged by CAC in conjunction with Essex Championships again proved to be a popular event with good entries throughout the programme.

Going through the age groups and starting with the under 13 boys it was Mason Sanford up front winning in 5m 06.43s with Dylan Law on 5m 15.40s collecting the Essex silver medal with his second place. Also in this event Freddie Blacketer (5m 25.07s),in the `B`race Jake Sarse-Peacock and James Pollard were also representing the hosts. The girls race found Brentwood filling the first two position with Maddison Kindler and Sophia Davies with our Bella Kehoe (5m 33.72s) just missing out on the bronze medal. Leila Robinson, Scarlett Metcalfe, Jessica Hobson and Abigail Knight also saw that the hosts were well represented. Moving to the under 15 boys and it was Fred Ferman in 4m 40.61s  leading Jamie Gilbey for the awards. CAC`s Jake Boarer placed 5th in 5m02.77s with Joshua Humphries eighth on 5m 13.13s. In the girls under 15 there was success for Brentwood with the first two past the post with Summer Smith on 4m 54.44s followed by Heidi Woodley (4m 55.16s) with Lily Sanford taking third spot on 5m 10.07s with fellow Chelmsford members Erin Kelly, Francesca Phillips, Isabella Eida and Isla Kehoe following closely behind. From the under 17`s and it was one and two for Havering via Freddie Rowe (4m 36.47s) and Sam Horsley (4m 37.42s). This result was much in abeyance to the tape with Max Chivers (4m 38.72s) and Erin Kelly (4m 39.89s) placing 3rd and 4th close by for Chelmsford whilst Daniel Pollard, Jacob Parrott and Luke Webb following in were not far back. There was a clear winner from the women's race with Olivia Forrest taking the title with 5m 00.07s . Chelmsford`s Amelie Shipton on 5m 09.04s gained the silver placing with 5m 09.04s with Hetty Harrison and Jessica Walker also involved. In the senior men`s race Paul Grange (4m 31.02) led a CAC one two as Tom Rehall was close behind. The women's race was a mixture of age ranges and it was Kiera Atkinson (5m 03.03s) leading in with sister Kayleigh third. For the veteran men over 40  Will Parrott won in 5m 04.12s  and at over 50 level Lee Martin finished second in 4m 58.79s. It is noted that running unattached in the over 40`s a Sam Eida placed third, is he attempting to keep up with his daughter. Races for under 11`s were included in the programme and the Chelmsford Endurance Club were well represented with Jacob Smithyes in second place in the boys in 5m32.86s. Tony Hatt, Lewis Boarer and Ben Padfield also featured. In the girls Olivia Bilby was best placed in sixth spot with Hannah Hogben, Bailey Kehoe, Cleo Robinson and Coco Phillips also in the mix. Currently this age group is not recognised as an Essex Championship event.

Part of this year's Miles of Miles was the newly introduced Cornell Mile Challenge Cup, an inter club competition based on each clubs combined best position in each age category. It was contested this year by Brentwood Beagles AC, Colchester Harriers AC and us. It was nip and tuck all the way with us pipping it at the end. We are the first club whose name will be etched on the shiny new trophy and on top of that we were awarded £1000 by our sponsors Comms Express with Brentwood winning £500 and Colchester £250. The Cornell Cup will be contested again in 12 months time... Who's up for it next time?

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Report written by Roy Meadowcroft