The Easter long weekend stayed bitterly cold but many Donore athletes had fine runs at fixtures all over Ireland.

Marathon man George Brady is back racing and he was 2nd in the very challenging Slieve Bloom half marathon which featured some rocky terrain and steep hills so a time of 82.27 was excellent in such conditions. Twins Ide and Sorcha Nic Dhomnnaill were 1st and 2nd placed ladies in the Tornafulla 5K in their native Limerick, they did 19.22 and 19.30 respectively and fellow Limerick native John Downes raced (time not available).

Shane McAuley did 30.35 at the Easter Sunday Fr Murphy’s AC 5 mile in Kildalkey Meath. In Killarney on Good Friday Des Tremble was the 2nd M40 in the 5 mile there in a time of 29.11.

This week’s 5k parkrun in Malahide saw Darren Hand come 3rd in a time of 16.44 and it’s good to see Cindy Kelly (Hickey) running again – she did a time of 21.06.

Belated well done to Anne Gormley who donned the Irish vest again, competing in the W45 category at the 3k and 5k walks at the European Veterans Indoors Championships last week in San Sebastian.