SHINING STARS OF
Sports reporter THE Wicklow Star Awards 2016 were held in Roundwood Parish Hall recently.
The awards, organised by the Wicklow Athletics County Board, are a celebration of all of the top athletes in Wicklow who won medals in national and international events.
Award winners range from u-14 right up to masters grades. 2016 was a hugely successful year for athletics in County Wicklow, with 12 Wicklow athletes representing Ireland on the international stage.
This is the highest number of Wicklow athletes competing internationally that there has ever been. Chairman of Wicklow Athletics, Bill Porter, commented that 2016 was another great year for athletics in County Wicklow.
He pointed to the significant number of winners in all grades, from junior to masters. This included a Masters gold medal victory at an international relay event.
Furthermore, there was a significant number of personal bests set by a number of athletes throughout the year in a range of events including the marathon. A particularly noteworthy achievement was that of Fionnuala McCormack who recently became the most capped female athlete in Ireland.
Porter noted that this is a fantastic achievement, and commented: “this is a particularly significant achievement for Fionnuala, especially when you consider the previous record holder, Sonia O’Sullivan, who represented Ireland on 34 occasions”.
Fionnuala, who has competed at the Olympic Games, has now represented her country a staggering 35 times and this tally is set to increase further over the coming years.
Indeed, Bill Porter noted that it will be a very long time before Fionnuala’s record is broken as she is looking forward to many international events in the near future.
To mark this achievement, Fionnuala was presented with an award from Athletics Association Ireland.
On behalf of the Wicklow Athletics County Board, Bill Porter said he would like to congratulate all of the athletes on their accomplishments throughout the year.
Porter also thanked a number of parties. These included the Wicklow People for their support and attendance at a number of events throughout the year, Roundwood Athletics Club for hosting the awards ceremony and for the excellent refreshments, Cyril Smyth who put in a huge amount of work putting together the booklet provided and County Secretary Dermot Brennan for his superb work throughout the year.
Bill Porter also expressed his excitement for the coming year and his hope for the success of Wicklow athletes to continue into the future, noting “we’re hoping to start 2017 as well as we finished 2016”.