Blood, sweat and tears for Drogheda AC
IT really was a case of mud, sweat and tears for Drogheda & District athletes at Sunday’s cross-country trial race held at the National Sports Campus in Abbottstown.
With the first three finishers in the Masters events guaranteed a much-coveted Irish singlet for the upcoming British and Irish Masters Championships, which will be held in Swansea next month, the atmosphere was electric as the starter called the athletes to the line.
Among them was D&D’s own Pat O’Grady who has known the highs and lows of being an international athlete, and right from the gun he set out his stall when moving swiftly into the leading group in his M55 category.
The next 7.5km were all about hard, sustained running on this purpose-built course where long sandy stretches and undulating hills sap the strength out of even the most determined runners’ legs.
With just over a lap to go, O’Grady was now up to second place and knew the real work was just beginning as he pushed hard to hold off his closing rivals, and the chase was on in earnest for the top three places.
O’Grady, who’s small in stature but huge in heart when it comes to the fight needed to succeed at this level, gave it his all coming down the home straight and was rewarded with a silver-medal finish and will be on the plane to Swansea next month.
In the Men’s O-40 race, which was of a very high standard this year, Stephen Kelly went close when finishing seventh in his category, less than 20 seconds behind the third-place qualifier, while Paul Smith ran well to finish 13th.
Also running was David Walsh, who has made a welcome return to racing, and he’ll go better with some more races in his legs.
Conor Cooney was really up against it in his Men’s O-60 race but acquitted himself well when finishing eighth in his category.
In the Women’s O-60 event, Nuala Reilly hung in when the going got tough to finish fifth in her category and might yet get the call-up for Swansea.
Yasmin Canning, who can always be counted on to deliver the big run when it matters the most, finished a magnificent sixth against some quality opposition in her O-45 race and that Irish singlet is getting closer every year.
In the Women’s O-40 event, Mary Leech, who has already won a European track medal this year, put in a quality run to finish eighth in her category against athletes who’ve been targeting this race all year.
Young Tadhg Donnelly got to mix it with some of the best runners that Irish athletics has to offer when he stepped way out of his age group to finish 20th in his 6K race in a lively 19:53.
At the mid-week ALSAA Winter League, Christy Duffy ran the Mile in 6:51, with Gerard Fay close behind in 6:54.
Elsewhere, Liam Farrell ran last week’s Bucharest Half-Marathon in 1:45:59.
Closer to home at the Oldbridge Parkrun, Mark O’Shea did a double of sorts when winning for the second week in a row in a fine 17:19.
Not far behind was Johnny Breen who’s a real find for the Drogheda & District club, and his time of 18:14 when finishing runner-up shows that he’s in good shape.
Also running were Brian Guilfoyle who finished 25th in 23:07, with Sean Corcoran 30th in 24:07 and Paul McArdle 43rd in 26:02. Deirdre McFerran was 47th in 26:15 and Ruth Dunne 66th in 32:21.