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Amazing Weekend Wraps up Indoor Season
Craughwell AC's U19 Girls Relay Team, National 4x200m silver medallists
Shauna Tobin, Siona Lawless, Arlene Earl, Laura Cunningham, Lorraine Delaney
The final day of the National Juvenile Indoor Track & Field took place in Athlone IT last Saturday where Craughwell AC rounded off its most successful year ever of indoor competition with 5 more medals coming its way. Laura Cunningham and Lorraine Delaney got the day off to a wonderful start when taking the silver and bronze medals in the U19 Girls High Jump, both with leaps of 1.55m. And both girls combined with Arlene Earls and Siona Lawless to race to the silver medals in an exhilarating performance in the U19 Girls 4x200m and an excellent time of 1.47.85. The medals continued to flow in the U19 Boys High Jump where Jerry Keary leaped to the silver medal with a best of 1.89m. Chloe Casey wrapped up the medal-winning performances with an excellent 12.77m to take the silver in the U17 Girls Shot Putt.
It rounded off an incredible championships for Laura who won 4 National medals over the 3 weekends with bronze in the long jump, silver in the triple jump, silver in the relay and silver in the high jump - coming very close to the gold medal. And it was also very special for Lorraine with 2 National medals last Saturday having placed 4th on numerous occasions in the past in the 3 jumping events.
Chloe Casey, National silver medallist in the U17 Girls Shot Putt
and Jerry Keary, National silver medallist in the U19 Boys High Jump
The U16 Boys team of Shaun Gilligan, Pascal Walsh, Conor Trehy and Robert Urquhart put in a strong performance in their 4x200m, qualifying for the final in a time of 1.43.96 and placing an excellent 4th in the final in a time of 1.44.05, a feat almost repeated by the U16 Girls who qualified out of the heats in a time of 1.51.51 and placed 6th in the final in a time of 1.52.09 with their team of Chloe Farragher, Aleisha Larkin, Ava Finn and Ellie Cronin. A strong U16 squad saw the club’s second team place 4th in the heats of the U16 Girls in a time of 1.56.73. The U14 boys and girls teams also battled hard in their heats with the boys placing 4th in a time of 1.54.53 and the girls unfortunately disqualified due to a zone fault.
Ellie Cronin came close to the individual medals in the U16 Girls High Jump when placing 5th and leaping 1.55m which was the same height as the bronze medalist but losing out on countback of knocked bars. Aine Kelly placed 8th in the same event with a leap of 1.45m. James Furey placed 8th in the U16 Boys High Jump with 1.40m, as did Pascal Walsh in the U16 Long Jump with a best of 4.98m. Conor Trehy placed 11th in the same event with a best of 4.83m, a position shared by Jade Moorhead in the U14 Girls Long Jump with a best of 3.88m. Lukas Schukat was 12th in the U15 Boys Long Jump with 4.82m while Aleisha Larkin was 18th in the U16 Girls Long Jump with 4.09m.
That wrapped up the club’s best ever season of indoor competition with 19 medals at National level, the previous best being 2013 when the club won 15 medals.
Laura Cunningham and Lorraine Delaney
National silver and bronze medallists in the U19 Girls High Jump
Galway Outdoors CBPs
Athenry AC's Iain Shaw has just published the list of Galway Outdoor Championship Best Performances for the juvenile age groups from a trawl of available results.
Galway_Outdoor_Championship_Best_Performances_2018.pdf
Well done Iain, not an easy task! Please let Iain know directly if you spot any errors or ommissions.
Some notes from Iain:
- Where a hand time is very significantly faster than an electronic time, I have kept with the hand time. If a hand time and electronic time are within 0.3s of each other I have listed both. Otherwise, unless stated you should consider the times for track CBPs to be electronic timing.
Cracking Photos from Nationals
Some cracking photos from last weekend's National finals courtesy of Kevin Moore!
Galway Outdoor Track & Field Championships 2018
From Iain Shaw, Competition Secretary:
Announcing the County Galway Outdoor Track and Field Championships. These will be held over 5 days this year, see below for details:
- Sunday 29th April – 10am – Dangan – U13 - U19s
- Sunday 6th May – 10am - Dangan – U9-U11 team events, U12
- Thursday 24th May – 7pm – Dangan – Junior / Senior / Masters Day 1
- Thursday 31st May – 7pm – Dangan – Junior / Senior / Masters Day2
- A third day for Junior/Senior/Masters will be held in June that will hold the county 10,000m track championships and a non-county championship throws competition – we may also throw in some graded miles on the third day.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Entry forms will be distributed in the next two weeks. Athletes must be registered with AAI BEFORE their entry is accepted. Any entries for unregistered athletes will be rejected. There will be absolutely no entry on the day for juveniles and a date will be agreed ahead of the championships which is the last and final date for changes/swaps/lates. After this date passes there will be absolutely no further entries or changes allowed.
(Craughwell AC footnote ... there is no competition for U8s (i..e born 2011/2012) this year as its not covered by the AAI insurance .. the club will organise something ourselves for those age groups)
Indoor Season Stats and Records
As PBs and club records abound this indoor season, its shaping up to be the club’s best indoor season ever at National level with 14 medals so far since the season began as well as huge participation across Galway, Connacht and National competition.
The table below shows the stats of National individual medals won in club competition since 2004. It shows a roughly even split between track and field events with high jump our most successful event followed by middle distance, long jump and sprints. An amazing total of 53 athletes have won individual indoor medals at National level in those 15 years with our most prolific medallist being Cathriona Farrell with 13 medals, followed by Sinead Treacy with 11 and Jerry Keary with 8.
A total of 20 athletes have won 3 or more medals as follows (note the stats don't include universities indoors, I have some seperate research to do on that):
MILESTONE CLUB RECORD IN TEXAS!
Damian was back at it again this weekend.
Rice University in Houston, the venue on this occasion for the clubs newest record and first ever sub 4minute clocking in the 1500m!
The official Mark of 3:59.45 was a 2 second PB for Damian, Breaking the old record of 4:00.40 Set by Jamie Fallon back in 2014, as he finished a battling 4th in his Heat 2, as part of a 3 man top 5 for McNeese, lead home with a winning performance from Welsh Senior Nathan Jones, followed closely by local homegrown talent, Fisher Hamilton in 3rd after an impressive sprinting finish over the last 200m.
This was the second meet of the outdoor season for Damian and the Cowboy's Distance Squad having opened their season at Home in Lake Charles two weeks previously.
Damian took on the 3000m at that meet, along with teammates Nathan Jones and Enrique Soto, finishing in an outdoor Best of 8:44.67 only marginally slower than the time he recorded indoors a few weeks earlier. The switch from indoor racing and Air Conditioning to the Heat and Humidity of the Deep South, showing evident for all 3 men, even as they went 1-2-3.
The Team Travels to Florida next week for the renowned Florida Relays Meet as they begin to shape up for the business end of the season, with the Conference Championships only a mere 4 weeks away!
More Amazing Performances at Day 2 of National Indoors
Lorraine Delaney who placed 4th and Laura Cunningham who placed 2nd in the U19 Triple Jump
at the National finals in Athlone
Another big day of athletics saw 4 more medals make their way home to Craughwell AC and several top-drawer performances which came very close to the medals podium. Leading the way, Laura Cunningham took the silver medal in the U19 Girls triple jump with a fine series of jumps and a best of 10.38m, with Lorraine Delaney terribly unlucky to pick up 4 breaks before leaping a big PB of 10.15m on her final jump which was just 4cm shy of taking the bronze medal.
Having placed 4th in the 1500m last weekend, Sean Cotter put in a monumental race in his U16 800m to take the bronze medal with a superb time of 2.04.87 – a very hard-earned medal and very impressive given that Sean’s strength has always been over the longer cross-country distances. And hitting the individual podium for the first time, Evan Moran took a splendid bronze medal in the U13 Boys hurdles in a time of 9.91 having earlier won his heat with 9.93. Repeating this feat, Ella Farrelly put in a gutsy performance to leap 4.04m on her final jump in the U12 Girls long jump to overtake 3rd place by the narrow margin of 2cm and claim her first National long jump medal. Tara Keane was also impressive in this age group with a fine 3.79m to place 6th.
Sean Cotter who placed 3rd in the final of the U16 800m at the National Indoors in Athlone
Read more: More Amazing Performances at Day 2 of National Indoors
Marvellous Performance at National Indoors Day 1
Sean Cotter and Patrick Noonan after their 1500m races
at the National Indoor Championships in Athlone
where Sean placed 4th in the U16 Boys final and Patrick just missed out
on making the final in the U18 Boys heats
Another marvellous day of athletics in Athlone IT saw athletes from the club take home 5 medals from day 1 of the National Indoor Track & Field.
First into action Laura Cunningham, Lorraine Delaney and Shauna Tobin in their last year of indoor juvenile competition in the U19 Girls long jump where Laura leaped am impressive 4.87 to take the bronze medal in a tight competition having held 2nd place for 5 rounds and just slipping into 3rd by 4cm on the final round of jumps. Lorraine took 5th place with a best of 4.68 and Shauna placed 10th with a best of 4.13.
The U19 Boys long jump was up immediately next where Jerry Keary switched disciplines from his usual high jump. Having struggled with his mark on all of the first 5 jumps, Jerry was placed 4th going into the final round with a best of 5.92m but pulled a massive jump out of the bag to clear 6.38m in the final round and move into the lead – but was immediately pushed back to 2nd place by a 6.39m leap from the Waterford athlete who won the event. Nevertheless, Jerry was overjoyed – a big PB and also a new club senior record.
Belated Results of Connacht Indoors
A very belated report on the Connacht indoors. I had hoped to do a more detailed writeup before the All Irelands but just could not get the time to do it so am posting the report I sent into the Connacht Tribune here. The first day of the All-Irelands kicks off tomorrow Sunday 18th March. Best of luck to all of our athletes who are taking part!
Full results of the Connachts are here: Connacht_Results.xlsx
A busy 2 days of athletics at the Connacht Indoors saw many impressive performance from Craughwell AC athletes with 26 individual Connacht titles coming the way of the club. Foremost amongst the Connacht Champions were double title winners Katie O’Donoghue (Senior Women’s Long Jump and High Jump), Sinéad Treacy (Senior Women’s 200m and 400m), Laura Cunningham (U19 Girls High Jump and Triple Jump), Sean Cotter (U16 Boys 800m and 1500m) and Chloe Hallinan (U13 Girls 60m Hurdles and Long Jump).
There were impressive performances also from Linda Porter who returned to competitive track action after a long period of absence to take the Connacht Senior 800m title in a good time of 2.31.84 and from Jack Miskella who eclipsed all before him in the senior men’s 800m to take the Connacht title in a 3-second PB time of 2.01.62.
There were Connacht titles also for Lorraine Delaney (U19Girls Long Jump), Jerry Keary (U19 Boys High Jump), Chloe Casey (U17 Girls Shot Putt), Ellie Cronin (U16 Girls High Jump), Saoirse Pierce (U15 Girls High Jump), Lukas Schukat (U15 Boys High Jump), Fauve Aylmer (U14 Girls 800m), Jade Moorhead (U14 Girls High Jump), Evan Hallinan (U14 Boys High Jump), Isabella Fitzgerald (U13 Girls High Jump), Niamh Duffy (U13 Girls Shot Putt), Evan Moran (U13 Boys 60m Hurdles), Tara Keane U13 Girls Long Jump and Darragh Kelly (U13 Boys High Jump).
Full results of athletes featuring in the top 4 from the 2 days of action are as follows:
Gold Medals for Sean & Caron
William Fitzpatrick, Finbarr McFadden, Ciara Sheppard and Sean Cotter (Connacht Gold Medalist)
Intermediate Boys/Girls from Craughwell AC running in the Connacht Schools Cross Country Championships
in Calry, Co. Sligo
Caron Ryan (Connacht Champion) Luke Evans & Cormac Morgan
A huge congratulations to the Connacht Champions; Caron Ryan (senior girl) and Sean Cotter (intermediate boy).
Only a handful of athletes made the trip to Calry, Co. Sligo today for the Connacht Schools Cross Country. This event (ironically) was 5 days after the Schools Cross Country All Irelands which were held last weekend in Waterford.
This was truly a fantastic day for our endurance runners as each and everyone one of them excelled in the field. With still weary legs after Saturday's All Ireland races, they managed to dig dip into their reserve energy stores and fight a tough muddy field (as Calry is historical for being). It was unfortunate that Cormac had picked up an injury and with much regret had to pull out of the race.
Sean Cotter (representing Calasanctius College), is having a fantastic both cross country season and indoor season, having medaled in almost all of his recent races. Taking it easy at the start of the Intermediate boys race he allowed a few other athletes take the lead this time, he showed his true colours after the first lap to over take his competitors and storm to the finish taking a well deserved Gold Medal. In the same race, William Fitzpatrick (Gort Community College) who arrived today with a chesty cough and found the race took a lot out of him, still managed to come in 4th place. Finbarr McFadden was the 3rd Craughwell athlete to cross the line, also putting in a fantastic performance to finish in 10th place in a field of almost 60 runners.
Ciara Sheppard (Calasanctius College); missing only a handful of training sessions during the bleak winter months and embracing the challenge of so many very tough races this season, proved today that hard work and determination pay off. Ciara crossed the finish line in 9th position. A fantastic achivement for this brave athlete.
In the Senior boys race, Luke Evans, another athlete that is going from strength to strength held back lots of competition in a field of 30? athletes to cross the line in 7th place. Super performance!
A huge congratulations to Caron Ryan who from gun to tape held her position and was awarded with the Gold Medal and yet another trophy to add to her collection. To manage this in Leaving Cert year is a huge achievement.
Schools X Country All Ireland's 2018
Sean Cotter (Inter Boys- Calasanctius College), Ciara Sheppard (Inter Girls- Calasanctius College) & William Fitzpatrick (Inter Boys- Gort Community College) at the Schools All Ireland's X Country
In what ended up as an unusual sequence of events the Schools X Country National Championships were held in Waterford on Saturday before the Connachts Schools has been held (next Tuesday 13th March).
The Schools South Connachts were held in Galway a few weeks ago and since then there have been several attempts to hold the Connachts; however, through "licensing" issues and Storm Emma, they have been postponed 3 times. As a result of the frequent cancellations, only 5 of our athletes managed to make it to the All Ireland's despite several qualifying from the South Connachts (Galway's) to the Connachts.
Although not quite as rough weather as that day back in February in Killcornan, Clarinbridge, it was nonetheless a day with "biting" winds and poor underfoot conditions.
In the first race of the day, congratulations go to our only Minor girl entry Carla Noone (St. Raphaels), who had a fine race to come in 50th place in a field of 83 runners.
It is almost the end of the X Country Season and what a fantastic finale for the Inter-trio above. Ciara fought a tough battle in the Inter Girls race to finish in 50th place, in a race that lost 12 finishers. Well done Ciara. In the Inter Boys, William ran up at the front from the start of the race and held his position throughout to finish just shy of the medals in 13th place. Another fine day for William, who recently won the All Ireland's Juvenille B X Country in February. Sean who has another attempt next year as an Inter Boy, charged up the field from a 30th place for the first half of the race, where he steadily gained places to finish in a remarkable 21st position.
Caron Ryan (Senior Girl- St. Raphaels) with 65 competitors to challenge, had an equally good race to cross the line in 27th place.
These athletes along with the remainder of Craughwells' Endurance groups have shown tremendous courage, patience and tenacity this season, and their efforts have been awarded.
Once I have the accurate results from the South Connachts I will update and include in article.
Kevin Ryan RIP
The club would like to express its deepest sympathies to club member Gerry Ryan and the Ryan family on the death of Gerry’s dad Kevin at the weekend.
Kevin Ryan was a member of the legendary Derrydonnell AC who dominated cross-country running in Ireland in the 50’s and 60’s. Athenry AC’s Mick Rice recorded their exploits in 2011 in his book “In Their Bare Feet”.
In the words of Mick “Those lucky few will recall that Derrydonnell AC was perhaps the most celebrated athletics club that Galway ever produced. The club won county, provincial and national championships almost without number over a period of nearly twenty years during the 1950s and ‘60s. The names of Derrydonnell’s star performers gained household currency all over the West of Ireland as a result of their championship winning exploits. Individual athletes like Willie Morris, Mick Molloy, Tommy Madden, Kevin Ryan and Willie Cannon gained near legendary standing amongst followers of the sport, not alone in Galway, but all over the country.”
Kevin Ryan is pictured on the right of the middle-row. Successful Derrydonnell AC athletes cir 1958:
Front row: Bernie Rohan, Eamonn Fitzpatrick.
Middle row: Bernie Ruane, Willie Morris, Tommy Madden, Kevin Ryan.
Back row: George Moran, John Joe Burke, Peter Michael Conneely, Mick Molloy, Dick Walsh.
May he rest in peace. Funeral arrangements are on rip.ie.
(footnote, as many will know Gerry went on to emulate his father’s achievements becoming one of Galway’s most famed and feared runners for many years and was still beating men more than half his age when he hung up the racing shoes a few years ago after winning the European Masters 10k in a time of 32.03 at the age of 49).