Titles for Riocht women and Farranfore Maine Valley men

THE Kerry Master Cross-Country Championships and the inaugural Kerry Juvenile B Championships took place in the Killarney Demesne on Sunday.

In the Masters women’s race Mary Daly from Farranfore Maine Valley was the overall winner and also claimed the O-40 title.

Farranfore women also claimed the O-35 and O-45 titles with Helen English and Emer Bevan respectively crossing the line top of their age categories. The first lady O-50 was Caroline Murphy (Gneeveguilla) and Niamh O’Sullivan (An Ríocht) took the O-55 win and team mate Majella Diskin was first in the O-60 bracket.

An Riocht took team gold with Niamh O’Sullivan, Suzanne Neilan and Carmel Kelly collecting the medals.

For the masters men, Donal Leahy led the field for Lios Tuathail ahead of Tim O’Connor (An Ríocht) and George McCarthy (Farranfore Maine Valley). The O-35 title was won by Finbarr Collins (St Brendans), O-40 was won by Tim O’Connor and Donal Leahy took the O-45 title.

The O-50 age category winner was Kevin Griffin (An Ríocht) and Michael Mangan from Star of the Laune was the O-60 winner. In the O-65 category St Brendan’s had the top three runners with Willie

O’Riordan finishing just ahead of David Kissane and Pat Sheehy.

Farranfore Maine Valley won team gold with George McCarthy, Dermot Dineen, Brendan Lynch and Denis Riordan making up the team.

There was a good turn out for the Kerry B Juvenile races with many young athletes getting their first taste of cross country running. The distances had been reduced slightly from the A competitions and there were races for U-10, U-12, U-14 and U-16 age categories with uneven age athletes allowed to move up a year to compete.

Bridget Power (Lios Tuathail) won the U-10 girls with Aideen Power (Iveragh) in second and

Emma Casey (Star of the Laune) third. The first U-12 girl was An Riocht’s Emma Cahill ahead of Emi Curran (Kenmare) and Keelin O’Shea (Iveragh).

The top three in the U-14 race were Lucy Mulgrew (Tralee Harriers), Katie Power (Lios Tuathail) and Marie Clare Daly (Iveragh). Deirdre Kelly (Iveragh) was the U-16 girls winner ahead of Cara Gannon (Tralee Harriers) and Rachel Neylon (Lios Tuathail). Gold team medals went to Lios Tuathail U-10 and Kenmare U-12.

Noel O’Neill from Kenmare won the U-10 boys race with Alex Collins (Lios Tuathail) second and Gary Cahill (An Riocht) third. Kenmare took the top spot in the U-12 boys’ race with Seamus

O’Donoghue finishing ahead of Cathal Byre from Lios Tuathail and An RIocht’s Darragh Cahill.

First U-14 boy was James Dillon (Lios Tuahtail) with Thomas O’Reilly (Kenmare) in second and Tom O’Flaherty (St Brendan’s) third.

Top three boys U-16 were Robert Stack (Lios Tuathail), Emmet Daly (Iveragh) and San Quintela (Lios Tuathail). Kenmare won team gold team medals in U-10 and U-12 categories.

Kerry Athletics wish the best of luck to Jordan Lee from Killarney Valley who, along with the rest of the Irish Paralympic Team, is in Dubai to take part in the World Para Games this week.

This is Jordan’s biggest competition to date.