Olympic Harrier Club in 21st year

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31987, 14 May 1969, Page 15

Olympic Harrier Club in 21st year

'THE Olympic Harrier '"*■ Club, which will celebrate its twenty-first year with a special race at Motukarara on May 24, is by far the most successful and largest harrier club in Canterbury this season.

Since it began in 1949, it has had 621 members. But the success it has enjoyed this season is by no means sudden, for since the first year of activity it has left its mark on harrier running in Canterbury. It boasts two New Zealand representatives and from its first season has provided athletes and harriers for the Canterbury athletic and cross-country teams.

At its inaugural meeting in October, 1948, five were present and one of them, L. E. Fox, a New Zealand representative in the marathon at the Commonwealth Games in 1950, is still competing regularly and suc-

cessfully. Last month he completed the New Brighton 50-mile run for the sixth time in seven attempts. The club competed in cross-country events in 1949. It was second in the Halswell road race and third in the C grade of the TakaheAkaroa relay, and had a Canterbury representative in F. C. Mair.

In 1950, two members, Fox and J. R. Clarke, represented New Zealand in the marathon at the Commonwealth Games in Auckland. Clarke won the bronze medal.

This season the club will probably celebrate its twenty-first year by winning every inter-dub event in the senior calendar. It will also be striving to improve its placing in the Takahe-Aka-roa open relay in September. In the last open race in 1965 it was sixth, the third Canterbury club to finish.