Despite the rather inclement weather on Sunday and not one you would normally consider to be track and field weather we nonetheless had 15 athletes travel to Templemore for the County Junior, Senior and Masters Track & Field Championships. Between the 15 of them a total of 26 individual medals and 4 sets of relay medals spanning all three competitions were won from sprints, middle distance and field events.
In the junior category we had gold medal winning performances from Sean Burke in the High Jump with a leap of 1.50mts and Jack Hickey in the 100mts. Sean also collected a silver medal in the 100mts while Brian O’Callaghan won a silver medal in the High Jump with a leap of 1.35mts. Nathan Bowe was very unfortunate in being caught on the line for the bronze medal in the 800mts timed at 2.12.8 for fourth place, a place also occupied by Jack Hickey in the 400mts in 55.02 and Sean Burke in the Long Jump with a leap of 4.57mts. The three boys combined with Dillon McLoughlin to win the junior relay in 53.14.
At senior level we had four athletes competing with Liam Kelly winning the 100mts and finishing 4th in the 5,000mts in 17.18. Susan Fogarty won the Shot Putt with a throw of 7.46mts and the Javelin with a throw of 11.85mts. She also finished 2nd in the 1,500mts in 6.26 and third in the High Jump with a leap of 1.20mts. Aisling Maher finished second in both the 100mts and Long Jump where she jumped 3.46mts. Caroline Fogarty on her debut finished 2nd in both the Shot and Javelin with throw of 4.95mts and 8.83mts respectively. Susan, Aisling and Caroline combined with Kate Harrison to win the senior relay in a time of 1.03.88.
Seven athletes represented us in the Masters Championships. Double golds were won by Sinead Tynan in the W45 3K (13.30) and Long Jump (3.21mts) and Sinead McLoughlin in the W40 100mts and 800mts (3.25). Kate Harrison and Patrick Bowe were also in gold medal winning form capturing the W35 800mts (2.56) and 5k (19.27) respectively. Kate also won silver in the Javelin with a throw of 11.06mts and the Shot Putt with a throw of 5.94mts. Sharon Kiely was another to win individual medals with a second place finish in the 3k in 13.37 and third place in the 800mts in 3.19. Jody Sweeney and Brian Carroll continued the club’s success at M35 level where Jody posted 2.24.9 in the 800mts to finish 2nd and 19.47 in the 5k to finish 3rd. Brian ran 19.10 in the 5k to finish second and 2.31.06 to finish 3rd in the 800mts. Kate, Sinead T, Sinead McL and Sharon combined to finish second in the Masters relay with a time of 1.08 while Brian, Liam, Jody and Jack combined to finish second in the Senior Medley in a time of 4.34.81 having finished fourth in the senior 4 x 100mts in 53.51.
Once again all our athletes came up trumps on the day with some fine performances across all disciplines. Congrats to each and every one of them on their displays and for representing the club with such distinction. Thanks are also due to those who travelled to support the athletes. Your support is greatly appreciated by them and really spurs them on to strive better in their events.