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
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)
The team very nearly didn’t make the starting line. First Torben Dahl called in with a poor IT band Tuesday evening (he had a miracle recovery), Angus Tyner did in his ankle on Wednesday night (he didn’t recover) and finally Amidou Dembele’s car broke down in Sligo on the way down from Donegal Friday evening. One rental car later Amidou was at least on his way to Dublin but injury and other commitments in the men’s team meant genuine concerns existed around whether Angus could be replaced.
That was until Richard Costelloe dusted himself off early in his Ballyhoura recovery and took over in the eleventh hour (thanks Rich!) and making his debut in the event. Derek Cullen and Anthony Breen also had their debuts on the ‘official team’ having previously only competed in the event along with the ‘Laragh Locals’. He ran strong despite sheepishly admitting his house-renovation project had left him short of training since qualifying!
The times they are a-changin’!
The final team thus bore only 4 repeat runners from 2018: Rachel Wisdom, Torben Dahl, Amidou Dembele and Yvonne Brennan with Marcus Murphy, Angus Tyner, and Blaise Kinsella (injured) and Johnny Conway (moved to London!) making way. By accident rather than design, the four returning runners ran the first four legs!
Barry O’Neill bore the captain’s mantle and sat down with club coach Rene Borg to bang out a time schedule based on people’s predictions. It was pretty good as it proved – the team predicted an 8 hour 31 minute finish and crossed the line in 8:29 – 45 seconds faster than the 2018 team.
Predicted versus real times
Looking at the team line up, we knew ahead of team that getting into the top-10 would be hard enough with many closely matched teams behind the run-away top-2 (TT Racers and Rathfarnham – TT Racers going on to do an unprecedented ‘4 in a row’).
Flying as high as 4th early on, the team eventually settled in 8th place (2 spots up from 2018) meaning a fifth top-10 finish in five years. No one got lost, no one was late and no one had any notable trouble along the route so that is about as uneventful as a Wicklow Way Relay can get. Even our tracker didn’t give out.
Placings by leg:
Leg 1: 9th Amidou
Leg 2: 5th Torben Dahl
Leg 3: 10th Yvonne Brennan
Leg 4: 15th Rachel Wisdom
Leg 5: 12th Richard Costelloe
Leg 6: 16th Derek Cullen
Leg 7: 11th Anthony Breen
Leg 8: 6th Barry O’Neill
Some history
Amidou Dembele ran Leg 1 for the eighth time – the joint-most attempts on leg 1 in the competitions history along with Nadya Dunne and Derek Charles. He has a bit to go to break the record for ‘most attempts at a leg’ which belongs to Tommy Galvin who has run leg 2 twelve times (!).
We keep track of every club runners history in the relay and it can be seen below with the 2019 times. Times before 2015 were run by these runner for their previous clubs/teams.
Barry O’Neill’s leg 8 time is the fastest time set by a male runner in our club and the third fastest overall and Torben Dahl’s 74:02 on leg 2 is a new club record. Rachel Wisdom’s leg 4 time was the fastest female time on the new (since 2018) extended leg 4 course.
Meanwhile earlier in the week at Downshill, our runners kept polishing off the form for the Wicklow Way Relay. Torben finished a good 5th followed by Barry O’Neill in 13th and Richard Costelloe in 25th. Colm Kenna was 93rd.
The final chance to make a claim for our Wicklow Way Relay team was had in the Devil’s Glen where a new and faster course was inaugurated. Torben Dahl – already preselected – underlined his credentials finishing 10th as our first man across the line.
Barry O’Neill had another stomping run to finish 22nd and he was followed by Richard Costelloe in 34th and Colm Kenna in 98th. 136 runners competed. One round of the Trail League remains and Torben sits in 8th with Barry O’Neill joint-14th.
A millennium and some loose change since Brodir ran into Brian Boru’s tent and slew the old king, it was Richard’s time to do the running as he secured himself a 10 mile PB at the Leinster 10 mile championship at Clontarf. Performance wise it was another big step up from his half-marathon in February so Richard seems to be hitting form coming into the summer!
A great turn-out from the club at the first of the IMRA Trail League series: seven GMACers turned out to race AND we still managed to have a good group out for the subsequent Thursday evening group training. The IMRA race drew a good field of 171 for the race which is probably the closest trail race to the N11!
Torben Dahl was first GMACer across the post. Second home, and thus doing his chance of making the Wicklow Way Relay team no harm, was Barry O’Neill in 30th
As three or more runners competed in this race from our club, it automatically became a counter in the club championships – the first of the season.
Derek Cullen was next and he had a close battle with Richard Costello who was only 6 seconds behind. Yvonne was our only female representative finishing 5th lady and second F40.
On a day where three of the four course records were broken on the Maurice Mullins 25 km and 50 km races, it was fitting that our two representatives in the 50k also had personal bests.
For Keith Mulvey it was a mere second better than previous times whereas for Richard Costelloe it represented his first stab at the race and at any ultra-distance race. Well done lads on a mighty effort!
It’s been a busy last 10 days on the trails and hills, so we’ll start with today’s result where Arne Klohn and Derek Cullen took to the local slopes of Trooperstown Hill and ran well finishing 24th and 38th respectively out of 125 competitors.
TROOPERSTOWN HILL
Killian Mooney, DSD 38:06
———–GLENDALOUGH AC RUNNERS————–
Arne Klohn 47:35
Derek Cullen 50:31
The previous day saw the running festival for Wicklow Hospice in Avondale where Anthony Breen ran a very strong half-marathon to finish 5th and first his category. Yvonne Brennan finished 2nd lady in the 10 km in 43:58. Richard Costelloe also competed. Full results will be available Monday.
Last weekend Torben Dahl was busy – Torben finished 3rd but unfortunately this was on a short course – a category created for the unfortunate runner who got lost courtesy of some crettins having removed part of the course marking! 24 hours later he got his ‘revanche’ at Oughaval Woods where there was no such troubles and he finished 4th out of 34 in the ‘full’ race.
Glendalough AC 