Marsden scores a 20s PB as Francis and Parsonage star at the Bridge Inn!

Steve Francis cruised to victory in the first of the 2011 summer series of the Bridge Inn 5k. The Bristol & West / Bristol Uni runner secured the lead close to the 1k mark and pulled away from his rivals before easing off to finish in a time of 15.26, as Bitton's Robert Farley (competing in his 4th race in 6 days) finished 2nd in 16.05! In the ladies race, Laura Parsonage of Team Bath won in 17.03, holding off Debbie Marsden, who smashed her PB to finish in 17.08.

Westbury's top finisher was Will Massey who ran a great race to finish 5th in 16.18, with Anthony Glover 7th in 16.33. Will's brother Alex ran 17.46, just holding off Robin Phillips in 17.47. Jullian Bailey-Gard Jr ran 18.24, Steve Hawes and Graham Clark (3rd V.40) both ran 18.43, David George ran 19.53, Hannen Ashlee ran 20.17, Tony Jefferies 20.18, Richard Hughes (a new PB) 21.14, Mike Harris 22.09, Myriam Camboulives 25.39 and Sandra Bailey-Gard 32.07 completed the Harriers turnout.

Great running from all!!!

Weekend Roundup!

The Hanham Horror provided a stern test for a number of intrepid Harriers on Easter Sunday. The race was won by Bristol and West's Phil Wylie, who held off a concerted effort by the host club's ever improving Robert Farley! For the Harriers themselves, first home was Terry Jewell-Davies, showing a welcome return to form as he finished 12th in 44.52. Then it was Alex Miller in 47.09 and Robin Phillips in 47.22. Richard Hughes ran 55.24 and Aidan Naughton 55.25. James Noott 57.55, Paul Smith 58.25, Jane Goodwin 1.01.39, Roger Long 1.02.43, Laura Tanna 1.03.43 and Linda O'Shaugnessy 1.06.38.

Further afield B&Ws Tom Merson won the Bampton to Tiverton Road Race, B&Ws Steve McGuigan finished 12th in the Yeovil Easter 10k and John Terry finished 12th in the 10k Stanwick Road Race, clocking 37.48.

Well done to you all!

Harriers in Parkrun Action

The new Ashton Court Parkrun began today and a few Harriers decided to brave it and tackle the hill in the heat! Robin Phillips was delighted to secure 2nd place in 18.59, just 10 seconds behind the winner Conor Kissane-Wood of Walton AC. John Percival in 27.45 and Jim Staynings in 29.52 were our other comptetitors!

Well done to you all!

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Marsden on top at Weston!

Westbury ladies strengthened their grip on the Weston Prom Team competition, as Debbie Marsden won the ladies race and finished 8th overall in a time of 29 minutes exactly. Zoe Dixon finished 2nd in a time of 32.21. For the men Robin Phillips finished 18th in a time of 29.51.

Also in action were Bryan McCarthy in 31.09, David George in 31.30, Alex Miller in 31.51, Matthew Lett-Charnock 32.24, Phil Court in 33.11, Clive Atwood in 34.11 and ladies manager Tamsin Chick in 34.32. Then it was Richard Hughes in 35.55, who took a rare scalp, as a battle weary Matt Ellis paced his good friend Craig Churchill of Teinbridge Trotters round to a new PB of 35.57! Then Sandra Price ran 37.46, Andrew Gibbons 37.59, Laura Tanna 39.23, Jane Thornton 41.39, Gill Anagonstakis 42.40, Eirian Thornton in 45.30 and Kay Ridgwell in 46.30 - great running all!!!

Collinson is a world record holder!

News in from the London marathon and Rich Collinson has entered the record books (along with his mum Libby) for running the fastest combined time for a parent and child (mixed). Mrs Collinson, 55 from Much Wenlock Shropshire, ran a cracking time of 3:36:39, which combined with Rich's 2:45:26 gave them the new aggregate record of 6:22:05!

See here for more details!

Harriers make it to Frenchay and a Spring Bull...

...not the hospital you understand, but the 10k for the 2011 edition. Leading the way was Terry Jewell-Davies in 41.10, just a second ahead of David George in 41.11. Nick Taylor ran 46.12, Alex O'Keefee 50.55 and Paul Mooney in 56.58.

Meanwhile the Horton Spring Bull run saw a 1-2 for the Harriers, as well as 6th place, as Will Massey took the honours from Anthony Glover - 23:22 to 23:58, with Will's brother Alex 6th in 25.48!!!

Well done to all!

More news from the VLM!

Well the results have been checked and collated and it turned out to be a great day out for many of the Harriers. Besides the cracking performances detailed yesterday, we also had brill times from Keith Hill 3:20:38, Vicky Jones 3:29:22, Debbie Cleary 3:39:22, Clivre Attwood 4:08:42, Kim Ingleby 4:13:18, David Taylor 4:16:09, Melanie Sica 4:19:40, Julian Pyrke 4:28:20, Brian Edgar 04:29:40 and Louise Hambly 05:03:35 - great efforts from all of you!

Voller breaks 3 hours, as Collinson leads the Harriers home

They say that the marathon is an unpredictable event and so it proved as a warm day in London greeted the runners in the 2011 London Marathon. Whilst the heat proved no barrier to the Elites, with the Men's Course record being broken and the Ladies only record close to going; it proved less forgiving to the rest of the runners, as neither our top male or female runner completed the course :-( Rich Collinson finished first counter for the Harriers in a time of 2.45.26. Rich ran a tactically sound race - clocking off the first half in 1.21.58 and only slowing slightly as the heat of the day kicked in. For the ladies, Sophie Voller will be delighted to break 3 hours for the first time, breaking her PB by nearly 10 minutes to finish in 2.58.12 and finishing 24th lady in the mass start! Colin Johnson will be another happy Harrier as he took 37s off his PB to finish in 2.57.04. Robyn Golding ran a solid race in 3.07.23, but Gregg Ward struggled in the final 10k to finish in a time of 3.16.28 in his debut at the event. Tim Synge ran a solid time of 3.27.29 to keep the Harriers flag flying!

More Harriers news as the full results become available!

7 Harriers could break the barrier

Well the waiting is almost over, as the 2011 edition of the Virgin London Marathon is finally here and it looks like the Harriers could have 7 runners break the three hour barrier.

Matt Ellis: Should comfortably finish as the Harriers top performer. Has lowered his PB over the Half to 70.27 and ran 1.53 for 20 miles at Bramley. He will be looking to break the 2.30 barrier and providing he can curb his tendency to go off like a rocket, he should easily achieve this goal.

Emma D'Alton: Has been running consistently well over all distances this year. Setting a new PB at 5k (17.28), as well as at 20m (2.09), all points towards a time of well inside 2.50, which would put her as one of the country's leading women in the main race.

Rich Collinson: Having decided against an attempt at a world record in fancy dress, Rich will  be looking to put serious inroads into his current PB of 2.56.06. PBs this year in 10k (34.04) and 20m (2.06) would also suggest he should comfortably run under 2.50.

Colin Johnson: Like a fine wine, he keeps getting better with age. PBs of 18.00 for 5k and 1.21 for the half show that he is in the shape to better his time of 2.57.41 from last year's Dublin Marathon.

Gregg Ward: A bit of an unknown quantity, he has been running exceptionally well over short distances this season and has improved his PB to 16.44 for 5k and 1.18.52 for the half. Less experience over longer distances suggest he will be looking to comfortably break 3 hours in his first race at the distance.

Sophie Voller: Will be confident of smashing her previous PB of 3.09 set 2 years ago in London, having improved her half time to 1.21.52, she must be thinking of a time between 2.55 and 3.00 based on present form.

Robyn Golding: Her debut at the distance and her preparation has been hampered in recent weeks by a niggling achilles injury. Early form points towards sub 3 and if anyone out there could do through sheer weight of personality when the going gets tough it's gotta be Robyn!

Good luck to all the other Harriers, plenty will be looking for GFA times in their age categories, so let's keep an eye out for the performances on Sunday!

Ladies news from the Road Relays

Whenever you announce teams in advance, it is always the kiss of death, as Westbury suffered 3 dropouts - Robyn Golding, Sophie Voller and Vicky Plume in the 48 hrs prior to the 6 stage relays. Despite this, Debbie Marsden 17.21 and Emma D'Alton 17.15, put Westbury in the top 10 in the early stages of the race.

News is that Aldershot, Farnham and District were the winners, with Charnwood AC 2nd. Bristol and West actually finished 2nd overall, but were disqualified on a technicality - a real kick in the teeth for the girls who had pushed Aldershot hard all the way. Mike Down will no doubt be groaning!

Mens news when we have it!

Girls aiming for top 10 at the road relays!

With a strong squad announced for the weekend, Westbury Harriers Ladies will be looking to better last year's 14th and may even knock on the door of the top 10 at this year's 6 stage relays at Sutton Park this weekend. On the first two stages are club athlete of the year Debbie Marsden and Senior Female of the year Emma D'Alton and with Lady Vet champion Robyn Golding, Sophie Voller, Vicky Plume and Zoe Dixon all scheduled to compete, they have one of their strongest squads out for a long time.

Sadly the men failed to qualify for the Nationals, but have no fear, they will be back with a vengeance at the 6 stage later this year!

Westbury celebrates its running successes

Last night saw the club's annual Awards evening, with runners young and old (or very old in Colin Johnson's case) rewarded for their efforts over the past year. It was also the time to present medals from the Gwent League, where the Girls U.11s finished 2nd team, U.13s were champions and U.17s were champions. Additionally the Senior Ladies were the overall champions!

Now onto the specific club awards. First off we had the newcomer awards. For the ladies, the award went to Zoe Dixon - who over the course of the season improved dramatically, culminating in 16th place in the final Gwent League event. For the men, it went to Robin Phillips who over the last 12 months also displayed some great form for the club. He lowered his marathon time by nearly 30 minutes, in recording his first sub 3 hr marathon at Dublin and was always willing to turn out for the club at the Gwent League and other club events.

Most improved runner. For the girls it went to Emma Taylor who ran excellently all winter and for the boys the award winner was Adam Wilson, who attained representative honours with Avon Schools. For the ladies, Hayley Johnson (no doubt taking advice from her husband Mike), improved over all distances, particular the HM and 10k. For the men, Dan Studley was rewarded for his excellent 31st at the Inter counties and 9th position in the Gwent League.

Now we move onto the Individual awards:

Novice Girls: Jenna Kelley - 2nd in the Gwent League
Novice Boys: Joseph Leather - following in his sister's footsteps!
U13 Girls: Emma Jones - 5th in the Gwent League
U13 Boys: Jake Bevan - Gloucs League champion and 3rd in Gwent League
U15 Girls: Abi Hall - 13th in the Gwent
U15 Boys: James Skelton - Gloucs League champion and 31st in the English Schools XC
U17 Girls: Kelly Leat - prolific on the country in all events
U17 Boys: Felix McGrath - British U16 Mountain running champion, and 16th in the Midlands XC
U23 Girls: Kelly Winstone - solid performances in all competitions!
U23 Boys: Dan Studley - that 31st in the Intercounties helped!!
Senior Ladies: Emma D'Alton - outstanding at all distances; particularly HM where she improved her PB to 77.49.
Senior Men: Gregg Ward - showed solid improvement, following marathon training!
Vet Ladies: Robyn Golding - impossible to believe she is old enough, but sure enough her PBs at Bideford and solid performances in the Midlands XC and road relays secured her the prize.
Vet Men: Colin Johnson - great efforts for the club whenever requested, and a sub 3hr marathon at Dublin.

Then finally the athletes of the year:

Female: Debbie Marsden - Avon champion over 10k, Fastest in the relays and the Midlands XC, twice called up to run terrortorially.
Male: Matt Ellis - won pretty much everything he entered (except for Berlin and London marathons) although he has a chance to correct that in two weeks. He will be looking to duck under one club record time in the Marathon - the ladies which is 2.28.52 held by Marian Sutton!

Well done to all of you!!!

Opposite ends of the scales...

but with similar lackadaisical approaches, Anthony Glover made his track debut for the 2011 season, whilst over in Sussex John Terry tackled the marathon. Juggling family and running is never easy, but Anthony took this to new extremes arriving at the track and registering 2 minutes before the 12 noon start time and using the 200m jog round to the back straight as a warm up Anthony ran 10minutes dead for the 3k. He then quickly took his family back home, returning in time for a 5 minute warm up prior to the 1500m, which he completed in 4.43.

Meanwhile over in Sussex, John Terry went in search of a 3.10 marathon time, that would secure his entrance into the 2012 London Marathon. Only tackling 20 miles twice in the build up is not to be recommended and things were about to get a whole lot worse! Some last minute course changes, meant that what the organizers had described as "undulating" had turned into one of Britain's hardest road marathons - incorporating 2100ft of ascent - equivalent to running a more challenging course than the Hogweed Hilly half twice in a row! Despite the wheels coming off around 20 miles, as the relentless hills took their toil, John hung in to finish 3rd in a time of 3.02.07. The winner was Hastings runner James Mountford, who clocked 2.55.40. James chose the race to make his debut at the distance, due to its proximity to his home! Let's hope the experience hasn't put him off, as with a half PB of 75 minutes, a sub 2.45 should be a formality for him on a competitive course!

Harriers race to victory in the Bitton relays!

Westbury Harriers' crack squad of Matt Ellis, Robin Phillips, Dan Studley and Gregg Ward scorched to victory in the new Bitton 4x5 mile relay event, beating local rivals B&W into second place. Matt Ellis got the Harriers off to a flying start clocking 25.30 and with solid runs from Robin Phillips in around 30, Dan Studley around 26 and Gregg Ward anchoring the team home in around 28 minutes, the glory was all there for the Harriers. A complete roundup when all the results are in!!!