Colchester Harriers' Southern Women's League team knew they had some good competition to face at the second meeting of the season, but pulled out some brilliant performances.

The Harriers started the day in second place in the league and the seniors made a strong start.

Nicola Gaisford completed a new personal best (PB) of 5.16 metres and came second in the A string long jump, while Jade Morgan came first in the B string, just one centimetre behind with 5.15m.

The track saw lots of valuable points being gained, with a double win in the 800m for Stacey Wheat and Denise Morley and another double in the 200m for Heather Shepherd and Bethanie Moore.

There were also two good performances in the 400m for Nicola Martell, who dipped under the 60-second barrier, and Felicity Abbott, who got a new personal best by a second with 63.5s.

The hurdles proved to be another points winner for the team, with Jessica Cutts coming second in the 80m and Gaisford and Vicki Wheatland both coming second in the 100m.

Wheatland then doubled up for another second in the 400m hurdles, joined by Alysia Halsey, who won the B String.

Ella Neale then came third in the 1,500m after a tough fast race.

Lucy Mapp joined Halsey in the pole vault and equalled her club record of 2.30m, with Halsey first in the B string.

The other field events saw more fine performances with Gaisford and Wheatland coming second and first in the A and B String respectively.

In the throws, Morgan and Victoria Thompson both came second in the shot.

Thompson then performed well in the discus, with Emily Fisher earning more valuable points, while the javelin saw Morgan and Cutts both throwing well and then Thompson coming close to the 40m mark in the hammer joined by Nicola Martell.

The last event for the seniors saw some exciting close relays.

The 4x100m team of Wheatland, Moore, Gaisford and Morgan came second in 51.2s, while the 4x400m race had a very tight finish with Martell, Neale, Shepherd and Wheat coming second in just over four minutes.

The under-15 girls started the day with good results, with Sarah White and Rachel Gooday both gaining new PBs in the shot with 8.90m and 8.37m respectively and first places in A and B strings.

At the other end of the field, Annabelle Spencer, in her first competition for the Harriers, jumped 1.30m in the high jump then later ran the 800m.

Kirsty Straiton also ran the 800m in a new PB of two minutes 40 seconds, knocking three seconds off her old time and finishing third.

She then set a new PB of 10.07m in discus, with White finishing third with 16.2m.

White threw the javelin to 15.2m and Sutton threw 10.61m for a new PB, with both finishing in third position in A and B strings.

Gooday long jumped 4.23m for third place and Emily Moore also competed, while Amy Gardner ran the 1,500m in 5m 53.4s to finish third.

In the sprint races, Kelly Sutton was third in the 100m in 13.3s and Chloe Young was fourth.

However, she sustained an injury and had to withdraw from further events.

The 200m saw Emily Moore and Sutton both win with 27s and 27.7s, before both then ran the relay with Gooday and Straiton to finish for a fantastic second place.