The Dublin City marathon took place last Sunday where conditions were ideal for the athletes unlike the summer like conditions last year.
The Club was very well represented with 58 members taking part, well done to all our members who competed. It is often said that to be part of a Club, any Club is great. But to be part of Clonmel AC is not just amazing but it is also inspiring, looking at the fantastic performances the majority of our members achieved in the National Marathon Championships in Dublin. The majority of these members joined the Club as regular fun runners and through sheer hard work and consistent training they have become extraordinary athletes. Some of them were tackling this distance for the very first time while many Club members were very familiar with the Dublin October weather, they have all got to be commended on such great achievements. The Club element was also personified by the great encouragement our competing members got from fellow Club members who cheered them on from many advantage points throughout the route, especially when people saw the Clonmel AC club singlet.
Back to the action and here we had David Mansfield running a brilliant race. He went off at a strong pace that soon saw him in a large chasing group that included Eoin O Callaghan and Tom Fitzpatrick. This group were clipping along at a very good tempo reaching 10k in 33 mins 37 secs and still 20 miles to go. They kept this strong pace going, reaching halfway in 70 mins 35 secs. Then as they approached the 20-mile mark David increased the pace and soon drew clear of this chasing pack as he was full of running and he knew that the leading athlete in the European Police Marathon Championship was up the road ahead of him and he began to reel him in. They say that experience is a hard thing to quantify but David’s experience of the Dublin City marathon route stood to him last Sunday as he reeled in the favourite for the European Police Marathon Championships just after 21 miles and from there to the finish line David kept the momentum going to come home a very worthy European Police Marathon Champion in a new personal best of 2 hours 20 mins 15 secs, a fantastic performance when one considers that he knocked 6 mins 28 secs off his previous best in last year’s race and a big improvement on his Rotterdam performance earlier this year of 2 hours 24 mins 57 secs. Looking at David’s split times, he ran the 2nd half faster than the first half when clocking 69 mins 40 secs for the 2nd half, brilliant. Then we had Jimmy Boland also producing a brilliant performance when finishing 91st in 2 hours 38 mins 27 secs, having reached halfway in 77:41. This was a major improvement on last year’s performance of 2:55:09, especially as his training was curtailed a couple of months ago for a short period of time. Then we had David Ryan, a seasoned campaigner over this route, putting in a brilliant performance when finishing 149th in 2 hours 43 mins 43 secs and a major improvement on his 2018 Cork Marathon run of 2:49:13 in June. At the time of going to press these three athletes combined very well to win the Inter Club All Ireland Marathon Bronze medals, a fantastic achievement. We also had very good performances from athletes like Nigel O Flaherty 291st in 2:51:41
Billy Moloney 507th in 2:57:25, this was a brilliant run by Billy who was breaking the 3-hour time barrier for the first time and a massive improvement of 9 mins 43 secs on last year’s run, indeed it was great to see five Club members go under the 3-hour barrier in such a high-quality race. We also had great performances from
Shane Greene 864th in 3:5:26, Conor Fleming 903rd in 3:6:26 and greatly improving on last year’s run of 3:13:33, Bernard Durand 1208th in 3:12:29, Cornelius McFadden 1382th in 3:15:11, Eddy O Donoghue 1654th in 3:19:12, Peter Kiely is another Club member who put in a great performance when finishing 1742nd in 3:19:29 and in the process re wrote his PB for this route which he set in 2016 when he ran 3:31:22, an improvement of 11 mins 53 secs, fantastic, Noel Gillman 1816th in 3:20:24, Tom Bourke 2004th in 3:22:55, Alan Carter 2219th in 3:25:41, Anne Marie Halpin put in a brilliant performance on her debut over this Classic distance when finishing 2377th in 3:27:4, Barry Horgan 2410th in 3:27:21, John Griffin was another Club member making his Club debut over this Classic distance and he ran well when finishing 2912th in 3:31:42, Richard O Gorman 2967th in 3:32:18, Noel Ryan Also ran a great marathon when finishing 3141st in 3:34:14 and improving greatly on his 2016 performance of 3:36:13, Sheila Perry also ran very well when finishing 3236th in 3:35:12 and improved on her previous best of 3:37:11 set last year by nearly 2 minutes, Bernard Feery 3258th in 3:35:23,
Vincent McHugh is another Club member who ran a fantastic marathon when finishing 3280th in 3:35:37 and in the process re wrote his PB for this Classic event by improving on last year’s run of 3:44:57, Michael Doocey is another Club member who has trained well this year and reaped the rewards when running a fantastic time of 3:37:13, when finishing 3446th and in the process shattered his previous best of 3:39:20 set in 2015, an improvement of 2 mins 7 secs, brilliant, Nicola Maunsell is another Club member who has improved a lot this year over a variety of distances and this was borne out on her great performance in this year’s Marathon when she finished 3487th in 3:37:34 and a massive improvement on her PB of 4:09:55 set in 2016, an improvement of 32 mins 21 secs, fantastic, Anna Byrne 3492nd in 3:37:39 and a big improvement on last year’s run of 3:42:15, Rebecca Doocey 3872th in 3:40:43, Pat Walsh is another Club member who re wrote his Personal Best over this route when finishing 3933rd in 3:41:16 and improving on his 3:44:49 set last year, Anthony Power was 4042nd in 3:42:7 and despite a disruption in training set a new PB and a massive improvement of 10 mins 50 secs on his 2015 run, Mark Corcoran 4246th in 3:43:48, Sean O Dea is another Club member who had a brilliant run in this year’s marathon when finishing 4911th in 3:48:58 and in the process improved greatly on his PB of 3:53:37, a massive improvement of 4 mins 39 secs, brilliant, Michael Ryan 5130th in 3:50:13, Caroline O Donoghue was another athlete who has improved a lot this year when finishing 5464th in 3:52:28 she re wrote her PB by 2 mins 35 secs, Tom Butler is another Club member who broke the 4-hour barrier when finishing 5488th in 3:52:37 and a massive improvement on his previous best of 4:29:42, Niall O Shea, another debutant putting in a great performance when finishing 5598th in 3:53:21, Kenny Brett was 5707th in 3:53:59 and a major improvement on last year’s run of 4:54:59, Michael O Donnell was another athlete making his Club debut in this event and he too ran very well when finishing 5785th in 3:54:31, John Laste competing in his 45th marathon ran very well when finishing 6276th in 3:57:04, Miriam O Gorman ran very well when finishing 6383rd in 3:57:33 and in the process improved by 29 secs on her 2016 performance, Brendan Coffey 6391st in 3:57:34 and another athlete improving greatly on last year’s run of 4:10:01, Alan O Shea, another debutant putting in a brilliant performance when finishing 6947th in 4:0:10 and oh so close to breaking the 4-hour barrier, Grzegorz Kecik 7098th in 4:01:25 and a big improvement on his Cork marathon this year of 4:8:30, Neil Proven 8302nd in 4:11:2, Donal Ryan who used it as a warm up for the County Novice B next Sunday was 9540th in 4:19:59, Brian Tyrrell 9599th in 4:20:26, Keith Robinson 9666th in 4:21:01, Mellissa McCarthy was 9958th in 4:23:12 and a massive improvement on last year’s run of 4:36:29, Sarah Barry on her debut ran very well when finishing 9969th in 4:23:17, Ciara Meehan, another debutant ran very well when finishing 9972nd in 4:23:17, Helen O Ceallaigh put in a fantastic performance this year when finishing 10381st in 4:26:31 and in the process shattered her previous best set last year of 4:41:48, over 15 minutes of an improvement, brilliant, Cathy Mansfield was another athlete who has improved a lot this year and when finishing 10444th in 4:27:03 she re wrote her PB over this course when improving by 64 secs on last year’s performance, Aine Butler 10824th in 4:29:47, Graham O Regan 11058th in 4:31:54, Orla Durand 11164th in 4:32:51, Ian Patterson was another Club member who has posted a fantastic performance when finishing 11324th in 4:34:36. This was a massive improvement on his previous PB of 5 hours 3 mins 25 secs, a whopping improvement of 28 mins 49 secs, fantastic running by Ian, Claire Falvey was another debutant running for the Club and she too ran very well when finishing 11395th in 4:35:14, Catherine Murphy, another debutant, ran very well when finishing 11981st in 4:40:54, Paula Dwan 11993rd in 4:41:07, Aifric Byrne, another debutant, ran very well when finishing 12345th in 4:45:07, Shane Meade, another debutant ran well when finishing 13149th in 4:55:06, Tara Guthrie on her Club debut ran very well when finishing 14867th in 5:29:43 and Roberta Ryan 14868th in 5:29:43.
Just a word of caution, at the time of going to press all I had was Chip times and not Gun times, so there may be some discrepancies between finishing times and places, still overall, we had some fantastic performances, so congrats to all our members.