RACE REPORTS: February 2022

Donna Quinn, Sheila O’Byrne and Catherine O’Connor at Enniscorthy 10km

With restrictions easing and weather finally picking up, many of the great races welcomed athletes in February 2022.

Donadea 50K – 12/02/2022

Over 250 athletes braved the Donadea 50km, and national championship race, on Saturday 12th, with quite a few dropping out due to unusual weather and trail conditions. John Conway started strong but a fuelling mistake midway through saw him lose ground as the race progressed – he still secured a PB and could celebrate his better half Laura take 2nd overall in the ladies race.

John’s time was also a new club record for the 50 km – beating Barry O’Neill’s previous 4:39:05 mark.

1 – Sean Hehir, MSB – 2:56:04

——–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS—————–

70 – Johnny Conway – 4:21:14 (PB)

Results: https://www.popupraces.ie/race/donadea50k-2022/

Enniscorthy 10K – 13/02/2022

The Enniscorthy 10k was productive and profitable for Sli Cualann and Glendalough AC with Inbhear Dee’s Kilian Mooney winning the men’s race and Sli Cualann ladies taking 2nd, 3rd and 4th spot overall with our own Donna Quinn the girl in fourth, Aoife in 9th and Parnell’s Hannah Nolan in 12th. The Sli Cualann ladies team went home 160 euro richer for their efforts.

Aoife Joyce
  1. Killian Mooney, Sli Cualann AC 31:49

9. Ruth Fitzgerald, West Waterford 35:19

——–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS (COMPETING AS SLI CUALANN)—————–

Donna Quinn – 0:40:25 (PB)

Aoife Joyce 0:44:30

full results

Ticknock WINTER – 13/02/2022

The Winter League continued with it’s third round – as usual we had smaller representation for the ‘northern’ routes where Torben and Angus had a close shoot-out – more of those to come!

1 – Enda Cloake – 0:39:27

——–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS—————–

30 – Torben Dahl – 0:49:23

36 – Angus Tyner – 0:49:56

Results: https://imra.ie/events/results/id/2136

TRIM 10 MILE – 14/02/2022

The weekend action finished with Angus taking on an extremely windswept Trim 10 mile which lead to a time that as he described ‘he could do in training’. Despite this his time was enough to set a new club M50 record for the 10 mile and finish top-5% of the 1515 strong field.

  1. Martin Hoare, Cellbridge AC 50:45

—————–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS—————— (competing as Sli Cualann)

77. Angus Tyner 1:07:31

See Also

WEEKEND ROUND-UP: Clara, Avondale, Enniscorthy

Last week’s National Masters cross-country marked the end of the cross-country season for most of our runners. But the action continues…

Parkrun

Our weekend running began at 9 am in Avondale where Angus Tyner finished 6th in the ParkRun in 22:12. Not long after the smallest crowd yet assembled for our penultimate Winter League race (perhaps the weather deterred?) on the crown jewel of the six courses in the league: Clara Vale.

RESULTS

  1. Cormac Conroy, Parnell AC 18:48

———GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS——–

6. Angus Tyner 22:12

full results

Winter League

The League has come down to a three-way battle between Aoife Joyce, Flora McKnight and coahc René Borg. All would have to better their handicap by 2 minutes or more to have a chance to stay in contention. Flora duly lowered her 29 minute handicap to 27 min and Aoife took her 30 minute mark down to 26 min. René had to improve his handicap of 42 minutes for the longer course to 40 minutes to stay within reach and just about scraped it with 39:44 – lowering Barry O’Neill’s course-record by 10 seconds in the process. All now comes down to Brockagh Woods next weekend where Aoife starts the day as the heavy favourite – her fate is in her own hands.

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Aoife at the Enniscorthy 10k. Photo: John Busher

Enniscorthy 10 km

Aoife returned to Enniscorthy for the first time in 12 years looking to improve on her 46 minute mark set in Inch in July. Storm Dennis meant this task was a bit more onerous than expected but she still came home in a chip time of 44:48. Mission accomplished.

  1. Ger Forde, Slaney Olympic 33:10

————–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS

99. Aoife Joyce 44:48

full results

Brockagh Burst (belated)

We also spotted – a bit late – that Lillian Deegan ran Brockagh Burst where she finished 180th.

  1. Killian Mooney 27:14

————–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS———–

180. Lillian Deegan 1:07:36

full results

WEEK SUM-UP: Brockagh, South Dublin and Never Give Up 10ks

Lots of action last week for our runners.

BROCKAGH

First in action this week was Colm Kenna  – doing his warm-up for the Frank Duffy 10 km 4 days later on the slopes of Brockagh. Newcastle AC’s Luke McMullan’s win meant Northern honours prevailed on the race. Colm came home in 72:13 for 103rd place in a mid-size field of 162.

  1. Luke McMullan 48:03

————GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS————-

103. Colm Kenna 72:13

https://www.imra.ie/events/results/id/1730/

AYLING ABYSS

A ‘hang-over’ from last weeks result must also be mentioned as Torben Dahl took on the technical route up and down Djouce – dubbed the ‘Ayling’ Abyss after inventor Alan Ayling. Perhaps still feeling the Tucker Trail 80k in his legs Torben swooped across the finish line in 27th – a bit down on his usual placings in the league. The next day he could celebrate his 41st birthday – congratulations from everyone in Glendalough AC!

RESULTS

  1. Barry Cronin 52:40

————GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS————-

27. Torben Dahl 63:55

South Dublin 10k

Yesterday’s big Saturday fixture is the South Dublin 10k – part of the Dublin race series – where Richard Costelloe, Colm and William Belton were in action. Richard had a particularly good run setting a new PB of 41:50.

RESULTS

  1. Paul Pollock, Annadelle Striders 29:28

————GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS————-

259. Richard Costelloe 41:50 (PB)

696. Colm Kenna 47:46

840. William Belton 49:24

With three club runners in action, this race becomes an automatic counter in the club championship. Richard’s win here means he now leads the championship as although Torben Dahl and Barry O’Neill can still overtake him if they ‘win’ their ‘run in hand’.

NeverGiveUp 10k

Aoife Joyce capped off the weekend action in Inch at the NeverGiveUp 10k, her first race on the distance for nearly 6 years. Her time of 46:06 sufficed in securing third lady’s spot and 2nd F40.

  1. Brian Kirwan, St. Laurence O’Toole 36:28

————GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS————-

28. Aoife Joyce 46:06 (2nd F40, 3rd Female)

REPORT; Wicklow Road Championship 2019

Image may contain: 7 people, people smiling, people standing, sky, shorts, outdoor and nature

While our seven representatives at the Wicklow Road Championship this year was our smallest contingent yet, they still brought home two individual and two team medals.

Rachel Wisdom and Donna Quinn took 1st and 2nd in the ladies O35 category and combined with Aoife Joyce, back for her first race in 4 years, to take the team gold in the women’s masters o35-49 category.

Due to injury and late drop-offs we only fielded one men’s team: a masters team and not a senior team as well as in previous years. Here Torben Dahl was first home in 17:52 followed by Barry O’Neill and Richard Costelloe who arrived close together and Colm Kenna as the fourth man to count.

Also a big thank you to the organisers and to our own volunteers who stepped up: Yvonne Brennan and Angus Tyner.

RESULTS

  1. Brian Geraghty 15:53 , Greystones and District

———————–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS—————

21. Torben Dahl 17:52 (team Bronze 35-49)

41. Barry O’Neill 18:50 (team Bronze 35-49)

42. Richard Costelloe 18:54 (team Bronze 35-49)

50. Rachel Wisdom 20:17 (Individual Gold 35-49, Team Gold 35-49)

65. Donna Quinn 21:03 (Individual Silver 35-49, Team Gold 35-49)

80. Aoife Joyce 22:15 (Team Gold 35-49)

81. Colm Kenna 22:16 (team Bronze 35-49)

REPORT: Winter League final round (Brockagh Woods)

We got the excitement we had hoped for in the duel between Barry O’Neill and Bruce Phillips of who could ‘game the handicaps’ and run the best. Barry O’Neill knew that a 2 minute improvement of his previous best would secure him the league but this was easier set than done as he had run 44 minutes flat for the hilly 9.3 km course last time.

round12of12
Result of Round 12 of 12 (Brockagh Woods)

Bruce came in without improving his tally – meaning ‘only’ beating his time by 1:57 would now be enough for Barry – a time of 42:03. BUT … it was not to be – despite lowering the best time for the course to 42:55 and taking 65 seconds off his best. To add injury to insult, Aoife Joyce improved her handicap the most of any runner on the day – taking 2 minutes 3 seconds off her mark and this moved her up into 2nd place overall.

overall12of12
Overall results (12 of 12): In bold the top-4 results of each runner

In the end 16 seconds separated Aoife and Bruce in the overall standings with Barry O’Neill a further 52 seconds adrift. Barry did secure the honorary title ‘King of the Hill’ for being the best performer on the hilly routes (Clara Vale and Brockagh) while King of the Road went to Derek Cullen who performed best on the Green Gapways course. In the end we had 19 runners competing of which 11 managed to get the minimum 4 to score.

wl bruce 2.jpg
Winner Bruce Phillips

In terms of individual wins Rene Borg did best with 5 victories followed by Barry O’Neill with 3. Bruce, Donna, Arne, and Aoife took 1 race each. Two runners completed all twelve races in the series: victor Bruce Phillips and Rene Borg followed by Aoife and Colm with 10 races each.

wl barry.jpg
Barry O’Neill – 3rd despite his effort and new course record

Best improver in relation to handicap was Barry O’Neill – who improved it by 2 minutes 59 seconds ON AVERAGE in his races . No one was closer than Aoife Joyce who took 78 seconds off on average. Fastest average pace of the league was held by Rachel Wisdom with 4:26 min/km (but this was based on one race). Bruce Phillips ran by far the furthest – completing 97.4 km over his 12 races followed by René Borg with 69.2 km (this shows both who ran most races and who preferred the longer courses over the shorter).

All in all the short courses were more popular with 70 runs over them versus 36 people running long routes. Based on results, Brockagh Woods is the toughest course followed bye Green Gapways and Clara Vale

route statistics wl
Course statistics after the Winter League 2018/2019

RESULTS: Handicap league Rd. 11 of 12

We had the most competitive handicap race yet at Roundwood Reservoir today. 8 out of 10 runners improved their handicaps. With 4 runners improving their handicap by more than 2 minutes and thus getting the maximum score, there was a shake-up at the top with Bruce Phillips taking the lead – 38 seconds ahead of Aoife Joyce and 57 seconds ahead of Barry O’Neill.

winterleaguerd11of12
Overall results after 11 of 12 rounds

It is only the second time the courses have been run so the fastest times run were reduced for nearly all races. Arne Klohn ran the new best mark for the 5 km (22:36) and Yvonne set the new ladies 5 km best at 23:56. The 10 km best times were reduced to 46:06 overall by Derek Cullen and 48:35 for the ladies by Donna Quinn. Barry O’Neill ran 44:12 but took the 10 km route along the lower reservoir so while his time has been accepted into the rankings, it won’t stand as a course best.

wlround11
Results Round 11 of 12

WINTER LEAGUE RD. 10 – Miner’s Road in the wind!

The plot thickened at the Miner’s Road where today’s 10th round of the Club Winter League was held. This course is known as a ‘wind tunnel’ even on quiet days so we set off with some expectation of high winds. Thankfully, it was milder than expected even if the outward journey was slowed down enough to make beating handicaps challenging.

Yet this was exactly what most did. Bruce Phillips took the day and the biggest handicap improvement – finishing 2 minutes 3 seconds ahead of handicap.

Aoife Joyce in second improved by 1 minute 41 seconds allowing. This meant both Aoife and Bruce leap-frogged Donna Quinn who dropped to 3rd. Third place went to club coach René Borg who bettered his handicap by 41 seconds. Colm Kenna also timed his run well bettering his handicap by 15 seconds to finish fourth.

The fastest actual time was set by fifth-placed Derek Cullen who ran 21:56, the only person nipping under 22 minutes on the day. Yvonne Brennan came 6th and was fastest woman on the day (2nd best time overall) coming home in 22:25 missing her handicap by 35 seconds.

WL Round 10 result
Results Round 10

It’s now incredibly tight going into the last two races – Bruce is only 5 seconds behind Aoife and Donna merely 53 seconds with one poor result to discard making it fairly easy for her to close the 53 second gap. Everyone else relies on breaking their handicap substantially in BOTH of the next two races – the only realistic contender outside the top-3 is Rene who is 2 minutes 35 seconds down. The runners who have not yet run the minimum 4 to score do no longer have a realistic chance of ‘crashing the party late’.

WL overall round 10 of 12
Overall results: Round 10 of 12

A good morning out was celebrated in the Glendalough Green re-opened after its January hiatus!

NEXT ROUND: Next Saturday morning in Roundwood for the Reservoir Rounds courses!

REPORT: ParkRun Updates – Avondale

More training than racing to report from this week – Aoife Joyce had a run-out at the Avondale ParkRun today for her first 5 km ‘race’ in nearly 5 years and had an enjoyable time coming around in 24:10 on the somewhat bumpy course.

RESULT

  1. Unknown, 20:06
  2. Gearoid O’Brian, Parnell AC 20:11

————GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS———

22. Aoife Joyce 24:10 (3rd lady)

Full results