BANDON athlete Simon Nolan produced another sterling performance at Sunday’s Irish Life Dublin Marathon when dipping just inside the 2:30 mark with a time of 2:29:24, writes John Walshe.
This placed the Innishannon man fourth in the M40 category and also made him the third Corkman to finish.
Despite the windy conditions, Nolan ran the perfect even-pace race, his first half taking 1:14:56 with a slightly faster second half of 1:14:28.
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First Cork athlete across the line – and winner of the M45 category – was Blarney native Barry Twohig, a former top-class cyclist who now runs for St Finbarr’s. He recorded a personal best of 2:27:08 with Colm Deasy (Leevale) next of the Cork runners in 2:28:50.
Meanwhile, at the Munster Novice and U18/U20 cross-country championships at Two-Mile-Boris in Tipperary there were a number of outstanding West Cork performances.
In the men’s U18/U20 race, Finnian Lawton from Durrus AC, third in the Cork championships three weeks ago, ran a brilliant race to take victory ahead of Jack Casey (KCK) and Shane Byrne (Togher).
Lawton was backed up by Andy Andrews, Liam Horstmanshoff and Sam Towns to give Durrus second spot in the team race.
The success story of West Muskerry athletes Saoirse Twomey and Aoife Lucey continues. Twomey added the Munster U20 title to the Cork decider won at Carrigadrohid while Lucey went one better than her Cork silver to take the Munster novice gold.
The previous week, Twomey had finished an excellent fourth junior at the Autumn International held at Abbotstown in Dublin. This came a week after her third place led UCC to a historic victory at the Irish Universities championships at Dundalk.
The Abbotstown fixture also included the selection race for the British & Irish Masters International which takes place at the same venue on Saturday, November 15th.
In a highly competitive M50 race, Michael Dullea of Skibbereen AC finished fifth, just two seconds behind the fourth-place runner. This was enough to gain him selection on the team, fulfilling a lifetime ambition of wearing the Irish vest.
Not far behind in seventh was Michael Harrington of Durrus and he has been named as reserve on the Irish M50 squad. Although she didn’t run the trial, Bandon’s Carmel Crowley’s previous exemplary record in various categories over the years has seen her named on the F55 team.
The final event in the Beara AC Autumn 5-Mile Series takes place at Everies on Saturday, November 7th at 2.30pm. This has one of the biggest prize lists in the country with over 100 awards on offer. There is also a one-mile children’s race starting at 2pm. Full details on both events can be found on the Beara AC Facebook page.
