Little reward for major effort in Tullamore and strong showing for the club (of you) in Clondalkin

Back row: Nick Ennis, Oisin Taylor, Gary Park, Katie Rogers, Paul Kelly, Alix Hughes, Sam Gaine, Catherine thornton, Phil Conway, Alice Bolger Aboud, Lara Murray, Paul Francis, Maria Hetherington, Jason Harvey and Anna Shine. Front row: Mary Horgan, Lisa Shine, Fiona Shine, Katie Rose Barry, Rhianna McCarthy, Arianna Francis and Mairin Shine

 Both men’s and women’s track and field teams gave it their all on Saturday in the National Track and Field League final contested in Tullamore, but despite such great effort, the women’s team will remain in Division 1 for another year (but hopefully third time lucky next year), taking 5th place (with only the first two teams promoted), whilst a podium place in the Premier Division also eluded the men, by a similar margin, with the same finish of a 5th position.

12 women and 13 men participated for the club in the final in Tullamore. Funnily, AAI sent out only one Instagram message on the day which was to record a victory that never took place for Matt Behan in the 110mH, when in fact Matt didn’t compete yesterday having picked up an injury recently. Strange!

Anyway, we did record some wins for the men on the day in the 100m and 200m (Andrew Mellon) and, unsurprisingly, for Adam McMullen in the long jump. Both athletes will be feeling good about next week’s national championships (even though Andrew was not running his usual 400m distance yesterday). Another good result came in the 400mH with Jason Harvey taking 2nd place to record 7 points. The same number of points came in the hammer (James Griffin) and triple jump (Oisin Taylor), whilst we recorded 6 points in each of the discus (Sam Gaine) and high jump (John Nugent). 5 points were contributed by Nick Ennis (400m), Brian O’Kelly (5,000m) and the 4x400m team (Jason, Kevin Woods, Nick and Peter Murphy), whilst 4 points came from the 800m (Kevin). As team captain, Gary Park did his bit in the 3,000m walk, earning 3 valuable points and not being disqualified, along with Michael Kiely in the 1500m. Then, our remaining points came from the 4x100m (Jason, Nick, Andrew and Michael), shot put (Sam) and javelin (Jason).

Whilst the women had no individual wins, they did have a couple of 2nd places: Mary Horgan in the 400m and Alix Hughes in the shot. Our multi-talented athlete, Alix, contributed a further 6 points in each of the 100mH and discus, along with Mary in her standard discipline of 800m and women’s captain Lisa Shine in the 1,500m walk. 5 points came from the 400mH (Katie Rose Barry), 1,500m (Katie Rogers), 3,000m (Catherine Thornton), 200m (Rhianna McCarthy), 3,000m steeple-chase (Fiona Shine, amazingly in her first attempt at the discipline) and 4x400m relay (Alix, Mary, Katie Rose and Katie). 4 points were contributed by the 4x100m relay team (Alix, Rhianna, Katie Rose and Lara Murray) along with the javelin (Alice Bolger Aboud). Alice also helped with the javelin, as did Arianna Francis in the high jump and long jump, along with Nadine Deehan in the 100m.

There were three road races this week on which to report. On Thursday evening the Liberties run took place. It’s described as a 4 mile race, but this is slightly approximate and it might be slightly long. The race on Thursday evening was won by Sean Hehir in 19:41 and he was followed by at least 4 Crusaders: Tim O’Donnell, who placed 48th in 26:08, Katie McElroy (96th overall and 9th female finisher in 27:23), Gearoid Grogan (126th in 28:53), making a return to competitive running, and Miriam Logan (195th overall and 36th in 30:37), off no warm up having arrived just before the gun.

On Saturday evening Dee Ni Chearbhaill took part in the United Striders 5 mile Stride in Co. Wexford.  In humid conditions on a hilly course (notably in the second mile), Dee ran 35:34 and came home in 62nd place, 8th woman and 1st F40 in a field of 172.

Then, on Sunday, at least 30 members took part in the first event of the KBC Dublin Marathon Race Series, the 10k, which last year was moved from its previous home in Swords to the largely flat environs of the Grange Castle Business Park in Clondalkin. It’s considered as a warm up race for those of us training for the Dublin Marathon in October. The route isn’t especially scenic, although it does take in Corkagh Park and the Royal Canal, but it is generally fast. On Sunday, there was a bit of a headwind on the first 2.5km of the 10k loop which was more welcoming in warm, humid conditions than a hindrance. The quality field was led home on the men’s side by Paul Pollock with a win over Mick Clohisey and on the women’s side by Breege Connolly over Laura Graham by similar margins of 15-20 seconds. There were only a couple of  PBs evident for the club and that may have been due to the wind, which also affected 59-year old Tommy Hughes’ latest attempt at the O/55 world record (nevertheless, he did place 9th overall in 33:59). Our club mates were led home by Rob Cross (15th and first M45 in 35:06) who was followed by Karl Walsh (34th in 36:20) and James Moran (38th in 36:31). Another top 50 place, in a field of nearly 2,600, went to Joe Walsh (45th in 36:53), and he was followed by newcomer Eoin Fitzpatrick (51st in 37:02) and by Frank Hague (52nd in 37:09). Barry McGuire came home next, in 65th place (37:51) and he was followed by Graham Crowley (77th in 38:05). Another newcomer, Richard Phelan crossed the line next in 91st place (38:35). Richard was followed by 3 other runners to break 40 minutes, which included Adrienne Jordan (119th overall, 8th female finisher and 3rd F40 in 39:21), Alma Hanevy (136th and 10th in 39:35) who flew through the second half of the race picking up loads of runners, Maurice Kelter (140th in 39:29) and by Rory Goldsmith (156th in 39:58). Bob Cahill continues to improve (155th in 40:03) and he was followed by Rory and by Catherine Thornton (159th and 12th in 40:11) on the back of her 3,000m effort in the league on the previous day. Kevin Lambe had a super result in 174th place (a 2 minute PB improvement of 40:29) and he was followed by James Cottle (180th and 2nd M60 in 40:44) who continues his recovery from injury. Paul F. Kelly followed James home in 307th place, another to record a PB (42:38), and behind him came Robbie Moore (394th in 44:00), Gian Piero Allerta (420th in 44:36), Dave Tuohy (465th in 44:33), Barry O’Neill (504th in 45:39), Olwyn Dunne (552nd overall, 71st female, in 46:31), Sean Cormican (575th in 45:26), Ciara Lynch (614th and 83rd in 46:45), Aoife Kelly (666th and 98th in 47:25), Miriam Logan (768th and 119th in 48:38, not far off her PB and in her 3rd event in 4 days), Tim Hyland (969th in 50:29), Joe O'Reilly (1,529th in 54:21) and Graham Farrington-Christie (2,282nd in 66:38).

Leo Lundy reported that he ran his 97th Ultra marathon (50k) at the weekend on the Mary Peters track in Belfast. How does he do it?

There was one IMRA event during the week in which we fielded participants. This was the midweek run in Wicklow which was an out and back around Djouce. The race involved a climb of 580m on a 9.8km course over moderate terrain. We had 6 competitors in the event, led home by Warren Swords (9th overall and 3rd M40, in 57:42) who was followed by Brian McGuckin (37th in 66:14). Gavan Doherty was next in 49thplace in 68:09, followed by Ollie McGrath (61st in 71:10), Kate Murray (122nd overall, 16th female, in 85:28) and by Maeve Muldowney (157th and 34th in 101:39). Then on Saturday Warren competed in the open category in the 44th running of the 15.2km Snowdon International Race (from Llanberis at the bottom to the summit and back, a climb of some 970m). He came in 83rd out of 613 finishers in a super time of 1:25:04.
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Poolbeg Parkrun celebrated its 100th edition on Saturday and, fittingly, its field nearly doubled as a result, with 14 Crusaders amongs its ranks. Stephen Hurley was its first finisher in 18:02. We had another first finisher in Waterstown where Zlatko Kulic headed the field there once again, in 19:52. Otherwise, our participation was relatively low over the weekend. Katie McElroy placed 2nd (19th overall) in Bushy Park in a time of 21:21 and she was followed by Miriam Logan (in her 2nd event) in 102nd place overall (17th female) in 27:40 and by Mairead Cashman (202nd and 53rd in 35:16). In Fairview, Berndt Heim, for once not running in the mountains, placed 73rd in 27:15, followed by Paul and Aoife Kelly (respectively, 125th and 146th overall (44th female) in 30:09 and 31:47). Further afield, Cormac McGuire ran in San Francisco’s Chrissy Field where in a field of 147 he placed 23rd in 20:54. Then, closer to home, Sarah Lyons ran in Burgess park in the UK with 448 other runners, placing 135th and 13th in 23:09. Aidan Hudner changed locations in Glasgow and in Pollok Park he finished in a time of 22:52 for 49th place in a field of 417. Back to Poolbeg, where Stephen was joined by Luke Davis (10th in 19:14), David Timoney (22nd in 20:29), Luke Haran (34th in 21:37), Russell Murphy (51st in 22:46), Sharon Woods (75th and 12th in 24:15), Aoife Cowhie (102nd and 23rd in 25:11), Cathal Murphy (116th in 25;44), Maria Pertl (117th and 30th in 25:46), Diarmuid Byrne (118th in 25:47), Mari Hansen (136th and 41st in 27:01), Karla Woods (190th and 68th in 31:27) and tailwalkers Darina Scully and Fiona Bane.
 
KBC South Dublin 10k (2574)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Paul Pollock 1 00:29:28
19 Breege Connolly 1 00:35:19
Crusaders AC runners
15 Rob Cross 00:35:06
34 Karl Walsh 00:36:20
38 James Moran 00:36:31
45 Joe Walsh 00:36:53
51 Eoin Fitzpatrick 00:37:02
52 Frank Hague 00:37:09
65 Barry McGuire 00:37:51
77 Graham Crowley 00:38:05
91 Richard Phelan 00:38:35
119 Adrienne Jordan 00:39:21 (8)
136 Alma Hanevy 00:39:35 (10)
140 Maurice Kelter 00:39:29
155 Bob Cahill 00:40:03
156 Rory Goldsmith 00:39:58
159 Catherine Thornton 00:40:11 (12)
174 Kevin Lambe 00:40:29 (PB)
180 James Cottle 00:40:44
307 Paul F. Kelly 00:42:38 (PB)
394 Robbie Moore 00:44:00
420 Gian Piero Allerta 00:44:36
465 Dave Tuohy 00:44:33
504 Barry O’Neill 00:45:39
552 Olwyn Dunne 00:46:31 (71)
575 Sean Cormican 00:45:26
614 Ciara Lynch 00:46:45 (83)
666 Aoife Kelly 00:47:25 (98)
768 Miriam Logan 00:48:38 (119)
969 Tim Hyland 00:50:29
2282 Graham Farrington-Christie 01:06:38
Full results here:  https://www.tdleventservices.co.uk/event-results/events
Liberties 4 mile run (1366)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Sean Hehir 1 00:19:41
41 Renae Cicchinelli 1 00:25:44
Crusaders AC runners
48 Tim O’Donnell 00:26:08
96 Katie McElroy 00:27:23 (9)
126 Gearoid Grogan 00:28:53
195 Miriam Logan 00:30:37 (36)
Full results here: http://www.championchipireland.com/results/index.php
United Striders 5 mile Stride (172)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Guntime
1 Peter Lynch 1 00:25:05
25 Sharon Cleere 1 00:30:38
Crusaders AC runner
62 Dee Ni Chearbhaill 00:35:34 (8)
Full results here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/16a9Tz9wnJe-lReaP_SULO23mCW9EqM1Q/view?fbclid=IwAR0iZw7rSrW-7UENCo7TJYx42t9Ry98qjOLEl0gsiZhTihg7hNx-rfhD10g
IMRA Djouce (164)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Guntime
1 Barry Cronin 1 00:52:40
21 Harriette Robinson 01 01:02:35
Crusaders AC runners
9 Warren Swords 00:57:42
37 Brian McGuckin 01:06:14
49 Gavan Doherty 01:08:09
61 Ollie McGrath 01:11:10
122 Kate Murray 01:25:28 (16)
157 Maeve Muldowney 01:41:39 (34)
Full results here:  https://www.imra.ie/events/results/id/1808/category/O/
Waterstown Parkrun #265 (67)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Zlatko Kulic 1 00:19:52
6 Ciara Losty 1 00:22:03
Crusaders AC runner
1 Zlatko Kulic 00:19:52
Full results here: http://www.parkrun.ie/waterstown/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=265
Marlay Parkrun #311 (431)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Ian Allen 1 00:17:48
37 Lorraine Nolan 1 00:21:09
Crusaders AC runners
109 Kate Murray 00:24:18 (12)
276 Orlaith de Burca 00:29:36 (80)
Full results here: http://www.parkrun.ie/marlay/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=311
Bushy Dublin Parkrun #126 (240)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Charlie McGowan 1 00:17:30
18 Christine Kinsella 1 00:21:13
Crusaders AC runners
19 Katie McElroy 00:21:21 (2)
102 Miriam Logan 00:27:40 (17)
202 Mairead Cashman 00:35:16 (53)
Full results here: http://www.parkrun.ie/bushydublin/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=126
Fairview Parkrun #103 (228)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Bobby Bedford 1 00:18:57
3 Aoife Brady 1 00:19:36
Crusaders AC runners
73 Berndt Heim 00:27:15
125 Paul F. Kelly 00:30:09
146 Aoife Kelly 00:31:47 (44)
Full results here: http://www.parkrun.ie/fairview/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=103
Poolbeg Parkrun #100 (231)
Overall place Name Cat. Place Chiptime
1 Stephen Hurley 1 00:18:02
5 Sorcha Loughnane 1 00:18:58
Crusaders AC runners
1 Stephen Hurley 00:18:02
10 Luke Davis 00:19:14
22 David Timony 00:20:29
34 Luke Haran 00:21:37
51 Russell Murphy 00:22:46
75 Sharon Woods 00:24:15
102 Aoife Cowhie 00:25:11 (23)
116 Cathal Murphy 00:25:44
117 Maria Pertl 00:25:46 (30)
118 Diarmuid Byrne 00:25:47
136 Mari Hansen 00:27:01 (41)
190 Karla Woods 00:31:27 (68)
230 Darina Scully 00:56:30 (97)
231 Fiona Bane 00:56:32 (98)
Full results here: http://www.parkrun.ie/poolbeg/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=100

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Rhianna McCarthy

Adam McMullen

Alice Bolger Aboud

Alix Hughes

Brian O'Kelly

Catherine Thornton

Fiona Shine

Gary Park

Jason Harvey

John Nugent

Katie Rogers

Katie Rose Barry

Kevin Woods

Lisa Shine

Mary Horgan

Michael Kiely

Nadine Deehan

Andrew Mellon

Nick Ennis

Sam Gaine

Oisin Taylor

Adam McMullen

Catherine Thornton

Back row: Katie Rogers, Alix Hughes, Catherine Thornton, Alice Bolger Aboud, Lara Murray, Arianna Francis. Front row: Mary Horgan, Lisa Shine, Fiona Shine, Katie Rose Barry and Rhianna McCarthy

Brian O'Kelly

Fiona Shine

Gary Park

Jason Harvey

John Nugent

Katie Rose Barry

Michael Kiely

Alix Hughes

Jason Harvey

Andrew Mellon

Katie Rogers

Lara Murray

Mary Horgan

Arianna Francis

Graham Crowley, Eoin Fitzpatrick, Robbie Moore, James Cottle, Richard Phelan, Alma Hanevy, Karl Walsh, Frank Hague, Catherine Thornton, Maurice Kelter, Adrienne Jordan and Gian Piero Allerta

Leo Lundy

Dee Ni Chearbhaill