Great Ireland Run 2017 (9th Apr)
The Great Ireland Run in a blustery Phoenix Park on Sunday 9th April incorporated the AAI National 10k Championships and giving the home crowd plenty to cheer about, Mark Christie was first to finish, giving him overall victory in the Great Ireland Run and also winning the National 10k title. This is a challenging hilly course, where the first 5km is always fast because it is mostly downhill before the runners get to the hillier section, including the Furry Glen, in the second half of the course. It was around the 8km point that Mark began his push for home, chased by Graham Rush (England) and Mick Clohisey (Raheny Shamrock). The hills and wind made Mark’s winning time of 29:30 all the more impressive and he was delighted to have won the race and clinch the National title.
The way the Great Ireland results are presented, it is impossible to search through all 10,000 finishers looking for Club members, but we know the Club members that were entered in the AAI 10k and can search those results easily and record their performances, so apologies for all the others that were missed.
Coming in behind Mark Christie was Timmy Murphy in 33:40, which is a new PB and placed him an excellent 26th senior man. Next to finish in order was Maurice Looby (34:49), Tom McGrath (35:27), Gerry Gavin (35:35), Ollie Donnelly (36:43), Pauric Brady (36:57), Colm Walsh (38:02), Alan Crowley (38:03), Mel Carthy (40:24), Mervyn Kennedy, Ray Daly, Maura Dervin (44:28) 3rd in her master category, Eddie Newman, Brigid McCabe (47:58), Terri Greene (48:44), Tommy Archbold, Pauline Troy, Lorraine Brady, Michelle Kavanagh, Des Walsh and Geraldine Walsh 2nd in her master category. Looking at the AAI team results, the master women team of Maura Dervin, Brigid McCabe and Terri Greene finished 2nd team and the master men team of Tom McGrath, Mel Carthy and Eddie Newman finished just out of the medals in 4th place, missing the bronze by about thirty seconds.
Before the 10k race, there were races for boys and girls where they had the chance to show their talents before a very large crowd that gathered for the 10k race. As we have come to expect, the maroon and white of Mullingar was prominent on the podium after the junior races.
In the boys 9 to 11 years 2,900m, winner was Ross Killalea, Adam Brady was 3rd and Sonny Drummond was 19th. The mini boys race was won by Niall Brady and Arthur Drummond was 3rd. On to the girls 12 to 15 years 2,900m race which was won by Aoife McGouran, ahead of Meabh Killalea in 7th and in the corresponding boys race, victory went to Andrew Daly. This was a really good day out for the Club’s youngsters and they could all stay on to cheer Mark Christie to victory in the 10k.
