In October I completed my first year as President of our fantastic and vibrant Club. I’m delighted to share with you some highlights from 2025.
Team Achievements
Our Senior Men delivered another excellent season both in the mud and on the road. They defended their Met League Cross Country title for a record-breaking 12th win on the bounce. Particularly pleasing however was the club depth on-show across the local league season: the B team secured a mighty 6th place in the first division – beating the A teams of all but 4 other clubs, our C team won Division 3 and, with it, promotion, and our Vets Team secured promotion as Division 2 champions. They won their 3rd consecutive Southern Cross Country Championships and bronze in the Nationals. On the road in April they won silver in the national 12-stage relays.
Our Senior Women are increasing in depth. In the Met League Cross Country after 3 fixtures they are in their best position since 2021: currently 4th in Div 1 and occupying the first two spots in Div 3, with the Vets placed 3rd in Vet Div 1. In November the team won the Liddiard Trophy.
In December our Women Veterans won Gold the British Masters 5k Road Championships in the V45-54 category, while the men collected Bronze in the M55-64 category.
For our Junior teams, the North West London League provided wins for 3 of our squads – U17 women, U15 and U13 boys. At the Middlesex County Championships in January, Highgate Harriers closed in 7 teams (out of 8) and collected a number of teams medals, which was a significant improvement on 2024. We achieved six team medals in total: Silver for both our U11s boys and girls; Bronze for U13 & U15 boys; Silver for U17 W and our top team was U17 collecting Gold. In December in the 25/26 season Middlesex County Championships our U17 Men won Gold with Silver for the U20 Women.
In track and field, our Upper YDL athletes, in a combined team with London Heathside, gained promotion to Div 2.
Individual Achievements
We saw some great individual national top 10 performances and rankings:
- Flurry Grierson won Bronze in the National XC Championships at Parliament Hill in February
- Karima Harris set British records for women’s V55 10 miles and 20 miles, and European record (unofficial world best) Half Marathon between January-March
- Terry Fawden was on the telly in the UK Athletics Championships 3000m where he came 9th
- Thomas Chadwick ran 3’47” in the BMC Grand Prix 1500m at Trafford, bringing him national rank #6
- Harris Austin came 9th in his age group in the National Cross Country Championships
- Leoni Delvendahl gained an age group national ranking of #8 in 10k through her 37:50 run at Battersea Park in July
- Sonny Allen took Bronze in the English Schools Championships in 1500m
- Arjuna Pflug gained a national ranking of #7 in 3000m through age group wins in consecutive years at Middlesex County Champs
- Amani Osman gained a national ranking of #10 in High Jump.
Club Highlights
The inaugural London 5000 took place on Friday 4th July. It was a fantastic event which attracted many excellent athletes. The elite races were won by Phil Sesemann and Abbie Donnelly. It was very pleasing to host a high-level event that enabled so many Highgate athletes to participate. The Club had a total of 30 finishers and was represented in 8 of the 9 races.
Reigning Olympic 100m Champion Julien Alfred came to visit the Club on November 4th. Her star-power lit up the track and many of our athletes got to meet her.
Quad Kids was again a sell-out series with around 100 young athletes from the community every month from spring through to autumn.
We delivered a pilot series of High 5 in November-December. This is a new community fitness class based on track and field training drills for ages 8-14, and we hope to build on that success next term.
Sending my best wishes to you all to achieve your running, jumping and throwing goals of 2026!
