National Seniors - Abbottstown Nov 26th 2017

Sunday saw the highlight of the x country session taking place in Abbottstown. We had seven athletes representing the club, on what was a cold day with the course in relatively good condition barring a few sticky patches. Fiona Santry put in another impressive display to finish 29th on the 8km course, just inside her aim of a top 30 finish. Her exploits at the same distance in Galbally 2 weeks previous clearly proving beneficial. Fiona fought hard all the way finding herself in a mighty race with a group of 6 athletes for the second half of the race, before finishing strongly. Our Men's team were the next up to do battle with five 2km laps in what was a highly competitive field of 170 athletes. The lads placed well from the gun, with the leaders setting a ferocious pace. Tim O'Donoghue put in a solid performance working hard to stay in touch with the front pack before picking off a few places to finish well inside the top twenty in 15th position. This was enough to earn Tim second place on the Cork team who secured third place county team on the day. James McCarthy was next placed scorer on the East Cork team finishing in 30th place after working hard through out, great running from James who also picked up a bronze for Cork. Kevin O Brien came home in 46th position finding himself running large parts of the race solo, which no doubt made it more difficult, Kevin also picking up a county medal. The recent x country races should provide Kevin with a decent foundation for the upcoming Novice and Intermediate All Ireland. Rounding off the team scoring on the day was Sean Mcgrath in 57th who fought hard, putting in a monumental finish to claim another few places. A tough four weeks of racing for Sean who is continuing his return to form. The All Ireland Masters will be firmly in his sights for February. Fergus Meade, fresh from his 3k indoor track victory on Thursday, ran a fine race to finish in 79th followed by Kenneth Kelleher in 83rd. A valiant effort from the guys who finished in 7th team position overall out of 19 teams.


Results at the following link http://www.athleticsireland.ie/downloads/eshop/Sen_Men.pdf

Next race is the Novice All Ireland on December 17th in WIT, Waterford, the only important event that weekend.

This weekend coming will see the staging of the Munster Intermediates on Sunday December 3rd in Beaufort, Shane Harrington and Kevin O Leary are the sole club representatives.