A bumper week of athletics for Donore Harriers with our own Jingle Bells 5k, the National Novice and uneven ages, some indoor track,  road and XC at home and abroad

 

 

 

Cross country

First up was Josh O’Sullivan Hourihan competed for the Irish team in the European Regional Military Cross country championships midweek.  He finished 5th overall out of 590 runners and was the 1st finisher on the Irish team which won the bronze medal.  The race, just shy of 10,000m took place in Schaffen Belgium and Josh finished the race in 29.38.  This is the third time for Josh to compete in this championship and his third bronze team medal in the event.

On Sunday 4th December a large contingent of our juveniles and 5 novice runners travelled to Conna Garryanne in East Cork not far from the Waterford border for the national uneven and novice championships.  This was a new course unknown to most, hosted by local club St Catherine’s AC and proved to be a challenging one.  In a series of agricultural fields, parts of it resembled a muddy pond especially as the races progressed and the ground churned up! 

We had great results in girls U11, our U15 boys won team bronze , and U15 girls 9th team.  In U17 girls and boys, the boys were 7th team and there were several Dublin county and Leinster honours for our u17s and in the younger age categories.  It has been a terrific few months for our juvenile cross country runners with many competing at national level for the first time – roll on the last one of the year – the Dublin juvenile league next Sunday 

We just had one competitor in the women’s novice race over 4k with 106 finishers – Cork native Aisling Kirby had a brave run on this grueller of a race in 91st.

In the men’s novice race over 6k – there were 4 runners competing in a huge field of 198.  First home was Ryan Aikins 92nd, Ian Fitzgerald 96th, Niall Lynch 103rd (who had been busy all morning with his coaching charges in the juvenile races!) and Alan Kinsella in 169th in just his second ever cross country race.  The team finished in 19th place 

Men’s captain Josh O’Sullivan Hourihan remarked that “all the lads acquitted themselves very well given for some it was a first experience at this level.

Indoor track

Abdel Laadjel, now a 2nd year student at Providence College, won Heat 2 of the Men’s 3,000m at the Sharon Colyear Season Opener Meet at Boston University Indoor Track on Saturday 3rd December afternoon. Laadjel put the disappointment of not being selected on the Irish Under 20 team to compete in the European cross-country championships at Turin next weekend behind him and ran a smart race tactically. He sat in 9th place of 19 starters through the opening laps, and made his way to the front group with half the race remaining. He took the lead with 3 laps remaining and covered the last 400 metres in just under 60 seconds to return a personal best time of 8.05.33. Nick Soldevere of Iona University came 2nd in 8.08.02 Abdel’s time is a club Under 20 record, but the old record of 8.06.24 set by Brian O’Keeffe at the 1981 Morton Games will continue to be recognised as the ‘best outdoor time’  (Thanks Gerry Naughton for this report!)

The second instalment of Track and Field live – the indoor series open to all competitors – took place in the Athlone indoor arena on December 1st.  Our sole competitor was Jack Byrne who ran an impressive 800m in the fastest of the two 800m races on the night.  He finished 2nd – breaking 2 minutes also in a time of 1.59.46.

Road

The 31st Jingle Bells 5k was a great success this year all the more for having a Donore Harriers winner and a club record and a sizeable Donore contingent also competed.  

John Travers stormed home for the win (See separate report for a full account of the race)After a disappointing year dogged with injury this was a great comeback.  13.53 is a new road PB for John and a course record.  He saw off the challenge of fellow sub 4 minute miler and track specialist Paul Robinson but the two made a great race out of it for sure.

Second in for the club was Darragh Fitzgibbon in 20th place in 15.18 and the ever improving Darragh Keegan in 24th in 15.23 – a new PB – together they comprised the winning men’s team on the day.  Sean Kinsella emerged 3rd junior man and Special mention to Ruairi Quinn aged 9 who ran with his parents and did 26.31!.  a number of parents ran with their children some in fancy dress!

Good runs too for

Dave McConn 15.56 PB

Kevin O’Boyle 15.58

Wayne Waldron 16.09 PB

Kane Collins 17.05

Adam Foy 17.06

Sean Kinsella (3rd junior man overall) 17.21

Ruby Kelly 21.24

Joe Kinsella U16 22.17

Adrienne Seery 27.54

Seamus O’Donoghue 29.05

Mark Quinn 29.30

Feargus OFlaherty 30.25

Georgina Nagle 33.34

Brenda Tyrrell Kelly 34.55

Blathnaid Hughes 35.15

Paula Morrissey 35.15

Gerry Murphy 38.13

Thanks race director Charlie O’Neill, Colin Moore and all the Donore volunteers who made it happen 

 

Marathon

We had one competitor at the Valencia marathon in Spain – a course known for fast times.  Tommy Allen ran an impressive 2.54.51 881st of the men and 2726 out of a big field of 21813.

Two women flew the flag for Donore Harriers at the Lanzarote international marathon which took place on December 3rd on the Canary Island.  On a coastal course Covering Costa Teguise, Arrecife, San Bartolome and Puerta Del Carmen – familiar to many holidaymakers, it is not an easy course with plenty of elevation and tough rolling hills.  Weather for the first two and a half hours was warm at about 20 degrees but then came the rain in a downpour for the last stages..  This is a race popular with Irish runners and Grace Kennedy Clarke was already third in this race in 2019.  She repeated the feat again here in an excellent time of 3.03.10 – very impressive considering the course difficulty and only running in the Dublin Marathon in late October.  This was also factoring in a brief stop on the course – in her own words Grace was “over the moon” with her race and time.  In her 31st marathon – and her third one in the past three months after Berlin and Dublin,  Anne Curley finished in 4th and was delighted despite admitting the race was “murder” with an undulating difficult course and long stretches of solo running, she almost got lost at 18 miles but got back on track and finished in 3.15.50!

Well done to all