Ladies produce runs of their lives

FOUR of Drogheda & District’s finest lady athletes produced the runs of their lives to win the 4x400m relay at Sunday’s National Masters Track Championships held in Tullamore.

Running against top-class opposition, the quartet of Roisin Coade, Erin McHugh, Mags Nugent and Mary Leech ran hard and fast to come home clear winners of this much coveted title.

Inspired by this, the club’s men’s team of Karl Carton, David Walsh, Hugh O’Reilly and Kieran McGrath ran as though they’d stolen something to finish runners-up in their 4x400m relay.

Such was the standard, the winners had to break the existing national record to just edge out the Drogheda team by a mere second.

The outstanding performance of the day had to belong to Mary Leech who won gold in her 1500m race in a fast 4:52. Running off a strong pace, Leech surged on the last lap to win by a four-second margin.

Leech is one of those rare breed of athletes who can compete well over all distances and terrains and will be hoping to run in an Irish singlet in the coming year.

Kieran McGrath came close but not close enough when finishing second in his Men’s 800m event.

McGrath, a raw talent, is relatively new to running and his time of 2:03 puts him right up there with the best in his category, with lots more to come from him in the coming season.

Also running well in his 800m was Paul Reilly who set a new PB of 2:24. Picking up bronze medals were Karl Carton, Danny Skeffington and Roisin Coade. Carton, a sprint specialist, claimed third place in his 100m event and later finished fourth in a very competitive 200m race. Skeffington made the trip home from the UK worthwhile when running a fine 4:34 for his 1500m event. Coade, perhaps the most improved lady runner within the club over the summer season, continues to impress with her strong running. Her time of 1:05.7 for the 400m is a just reward for all her hard efforts in training.

Coade later ran a fabulous lead off leg in the 4x400m relay, establishing a 30-metre advantage over her opponents.

Brian Pentony, another newcomer to athletics, ran a superb 58.9 seconds for his first real attempt at this distance.

Pentony, who has been mostly running 5k road races up to now, looks to have great potential at the shorter track events.

Nuala Reilly completed a treble of sorts when winning gold in her 3,000m race and later in the day bronze in her 800m and 1500m events.

The club’s sole competitor in the field events was Lynn Browne who finished a creditable sixth in the shot putt.

A wet and windy morning greeted the large group of athletes who travelled to the Phoenix Park for the Frank Duffy 10 mile road race.

Run over a new course and into a strong headwind, times were going to be slowed somewhat.

First home for our men were Brian Martin and Stephen Kelly who both cracked the hour mark with a time of 58 minutes.

David Gough finished well in 68 minutes, just ahead of David Shiel who ran the course in 70 minutes.

For the Ladies, Yasmin Canning had a really strong run to finish in 406th place overall in a field of over 5,000 runners. Canning’s time of 71 minutes augers well for her debut marathon run in Dublin this October.

Nuala Reilly picked up a second-in-category prize with a fine run of 75 minutes.

Aimee Corcoran 1:16:45 and Carmel Keenan 1:21:04 were the next finishers for our ladies.

Noreen Mackey won the Ladies 5k road race in Rathkenny last Friday evening. Run over quite a challenging course, her time of 19 minutes 27 seconds was excellent running and brought her home a mere five seconds ahead of the second place finisher.

Mackey, a very popular member of our club, was running her last race in the club colours before she heads off to Cork to continue her studies. All in Drogheda and District would like to wish Noreen continued success in her running and her studies.

Also running well was Simon Gregory who finished 13th overall in a solid 18:29.

Paddy Murphy, who’s racing well at the moment, produced a fine run to finish 17th in 19:19.

Closer to home, last Saturday’s Parkrun saw the in-form Colm Reilly run a new PB of 19:10 for this challenging 5k course when finishing second overall. Not far behind in sixth place was Francis Murray who finished in 20:26.

Noreen Burke was smiling as she ran a new PB of 28:37 and Donal Branigan finished 58th overall in 35:49.