Autumn Cross Country Report - November 26th, 2025

It has been a few weeks since the last report and that period has seen continued success for the club in the green fields of Cork and Munster, the highlights being the retention of the Cork and Munster senior cross-country titles.

County Seniors - Carrigadrohid:
The last Sunday of September saw the latest edition of the County Senior Cross-Country Championships take place around the undulating fields of Carrigadrohid. Forty six athletes took to the start of the men’s race and we had strong representation as usual.

The first couple of laps were a cagey affair with a group of ten or so controlling the pace from the front with defending champion Paul Hartnett, Mike Harty and Frank O’Brien well in the mix. The group thinned out though as the race progressed past the half-way point, and it was Paul who made the first major bid for glory with about two kilometres remaining, taking Mike with him. North Cork’s Jeremiah Sheehan didn’t fancy that however, and powered to the front with a kilometre to go, with Mike tucking in behind as they began to drop Paul. Mike then made his move with about 400 metres to go, powering to the front to win his 3rd county senior title with five seconds to spare over Sheehan. Relinquishing his title, Paul had to make do with 3rd place, a further five seconds behind.

Frank O’Brien put in a very solid performance to finish 5th which positioned the club very nicely to retain the team title. With a significant member of the previous years’ title-winning teams absent, it was an appropriately dressed Nicky O’Donoghue who sealed the team title this year after a very strong run to 13th. This was Nicky’s first county senior gold medal and, on the way, he claimed the scalps of a former county champion and a prominent social media blogger no less.

Brian Harty wasn’t far behind in 25th place, on his return to the senior fray. Ciarán McNamee finished up in 29th (4th U23) with John Spelman rounding out the club’s day in 30th (5th U23), five seconds behind his youthful clubmate.

County Novice - Ballynoe​:
A week later saw the county cross-country circus decamp to yet another field near Ballynoe – this time for the novice championships where we had teams representing the club in both the men’s and women’s races. It was an unforgiving course with a tough climb into a strong headwind greeting the athletes at the start of each lap.

The ladies got to experience this challenge first, over a 4km distance. Annelise Hutch led the cub home, finishing in 24th place with Niamh O’Connor in 37th. Sarah Goulding, making her East Cork debut, was not far behind her experienced clubmate in 40th position with Christine Kelly just 2 seconds and two positions further behind in 42nd. Lorna O’Brien rounded off the day for the club in 66th. This all translated to a 7th place result for the team.

The men were up next over 6k and of the 99 finishers, it was a quietly satisfied Matt Horrigan who led the attack with a strong run to 11th place, just three seconds off a top ten finish. Ciarán McNamee was next up in 22nd. Michael Furlong, enjoying the XC experience for the first time in a little while finished 34th with Martin Hennessy rolling back the years on his way to a 48th place finish.  The club placed 5th of 13 teams.

East Cork Novice – Ballinahina​:
The East Cork Novice Cross-Country championship has become a mainstay of the October bank holiday weekend over the last few years and we found ourselves back in Ballinahina for this year’s running of the event.

Unusually, a short 1-kilometre-long lap was used this year, so the spectator who chose to stand in one spot had ample opportunity to cheer on their favourite athletes as they whizzed by 6 times!

The ladies were up first and, unfortunately, we were just one short of a full team. Nonetheless, Niamh O’Connor and Christine Kelly ran well to finish just outside the medals in 4th and 5th places respectively with Eibhlin Cleary in 13th.

On the lads’ side, Michael Furlong was also just one spot short of an individual medal in 4th place.  Martin Hennessy was 7th ahead of his brand-new M50 sparring partner, Ollie Smiddy (9th). Eoin Hartnett rounded out the club interest, finishing up in 12th place in his first cross-country appearance since 2018.

Munster Seniors – Two Mile Borris​:
All roads led to Two Mile Borris in County Tipperary on the 2nd November for the Munster Senior XC Championships. Conditions were cool, dry and breezy and, considering the amount of rain that had fallen in the south of the country in the days preceding the event, the flattish course was remarkably firm. And fast!

Paul Hartnett was the star of the show. In his first Munster Seniors, he controlled proceedings from the start with Nenagh Olympic’s Cian Hodgins at least keeping him honest on his way to a deserved victory. The margin in the end was fourteen seconds. This will hopefully be the first of many Munsters for Paul and at this point in time he is the holder of both the Munster Senior Road and Cross-Country titles – a 100% strike rate in both events!

Frank O’Brien just missed out on the individual medals finishing strongly in 4th place, just four seconds behind Jeremiah Sheehan. A bit further back, Nicky O’Donoghue got involved in a race-long shemozzle with a gaggle of athletes, some cheekily seeking shelter from the breeze behind him…. In the final shake-out, Nicky wound up in 16th position. At this stage, East Cork had a two point advantage over old rivals Leevale for the teams’ title, both with three athletes over the line. Team glory all hinged upon who the next finishers for both clubs would be…

And it was Matt Horrigan, next up in 23rd place, who sealed the deal, showing further improvement over his run in the county novices.  He was comfortably clear of Leevale's fourth man, Heywood Richardson, who finished in 29th.

Stephen O’Brien rounded out the club representation, taking notes on his way to a 33rd place finish, no doubt grateful that the race distance fell a few hundred metres short of the advertised 7.5km.

Munster Intermediate and County Novice ‘B’ – Riverstick and the Showgrounds​:
The Munster Intermediate XC Championships were held on Sunday the 16th November at county HQ in Riverstick. Given the bucketloads of rain that had fallen in Cork over the previous fortnight, this was not a pleasant place to run with muck and corruption aplenty all the way down the hill, along the bottom and all the way up the hill at the other side!

Nicky O’Donoghue was the only East Cork soul brave enough to pit themselves against the conditions and he acquitted himself well, albeit in a diminished field. In the end he finished in the runner-up spot, just 16 seconds adrift of West Limerick’s Killian Lynch, the silver medal ensuring that he is now limited to senior XC at both County and Munster levels. In addition to his Masters duties, of course. Nicky was also a scorer on the County gold medal winning team.

The County Novice ‘B’ Championships were held a week earlier around a hairpin-infested course in the Cork Showgrounds. We had two participants but unfortunately only one finisher. Despite taking the lead early on, Ciarán McNamee succumbed to injury. This left Eoin Hartnett as our sole finisher in 50th spot, having been reminded of all those things he used love about cross-country since he last plied the fields of Cork.

Extracurricular activities – perhaps literally in some instances…
 - Both John Spelman and Ciarán McNamee represented UCC and MTU respectively with distinction at both the intervarsity cross country championships in Tallaght and road relays in Maynooth.
 - Christine Kelly took F40 victory in the Beat the Line 10mile road race on the Waterford Greenway in November.
 - A bumper field of 345 runners and riders took part in the opening event of the Cloyne 4k winter series last weekend with plenty of East Cork participants amongst the masses. But none on the podium. Hopefully this will be rectified at the next opportunity on 21st December.
 - The club AGM was held in Ballintotis on Tuesday 11th November. Minutes have been distributed to all club members but the big news was the appointment of Lavinia and Graham Swords as women’s and men’s club captains for the coming year.