It was another excellent day for Clonliffe Harriers at the cross country season’s opener, the Dublin novice cross country, in the Phoenix Park. As the fine autumnal weather continued it made for very pleasant conditions, indeed the absence of rain all week, meant a last-minute change of spikes from 9mm to 5’s for many, with the underfoot conditions showing a distinct absence of mud, on the contrary ‘the going was very firm’. The day’s programme opened with the Dublin even age juvenile Championships (report later) and then continued with the novice women and men.
It was brilliant to have so many Clonliffe vests in both novice races with 14 women and 17 men, both teams were rewarded with the women taking home team silver and the men’s team gold.
The novice women’s race was a 4,000m distance – a 1000m lap followed by 2 x 1500s. Lauren McKiernan, making her Clonliffe debut and running her 1st ever cross country race, led for the 1st 1000, undoubtedly the lack of experience showed as she was swallowed up over the following laps, her bravery however was not in doubt and she hung on grimly and ultimately finished in 16th. Jess Gallagher has been showing brilliant form all autumn in training and carried that into running her best cross country race to date, a fabulous run saw her take individual bronze. 2nd score on the team was Grace Twomey, who came through the field after a conservative start like the proverbial knife through butter, to take 10th, Niamh Quinn was also making her Clonliffe debut running an excellent race to finish 14th, 3rd scorer on the team, in fact Clonliffe athletes filled positions 14 to 17 – Jenny Johnston was the 4th scorer in 15th, then Lauren McKiernan 16th and, all of 18 months since her last cross country outing, Sarah Hawkshaw 17th. Alanna Burke took 19th, Ailbhe Morgan 22nd, young Aisling Kehoe 23rd, Sarah Owens 48th, Meadhbh O’Sullivan 55th, Caoimhe Curran 61st, Mel Curran 63rd and Fionnuala Smith 67th.
Clonliffe on 42 points finished in 2nd place behind winners Liffey Valley (19 points), with Sportsworld 3rd on 69 points.
Then it was the novice men, it was pleasing to see a big field with someone 130 or so starters. The Clonliffe men got themselves into good positions on the 1st of 4 x 1500 laps with Mahad Egaal, Malcom Kiplagat, Lee Duddy and Cian Murray prominent. With 2 laps to go Mahad took up the running opening a gap on the chasers, it proved to be a winning move as he came home in 1st position. Cian Murray had the race of his life to finish a superb 6th, Malcom Kiplagat was 7th and Connor Fitzpatrick was 8th, the 4th scorer leaving a points total of 22 well clear of DSD 2nd on 43 and Raheny on 78 points in 3rd.
The whole team performed superbly, 10th was Lee Duddy, 12th Damien Prendergast, 21st Evan Lynch, 26th Niall Sherlock, 27th Robert Mackey, 32nd Greg Hossenny, 38 Eamon Harkin, 40th Andrew Gaffney, 61st Peter Bohan, 108 Kevin Gormley, 119th Andrew D’Arcy, 120th Daragh Morris, 125th Ben Power.
So on the whole a fantastic start to the cross country season – team gold for the men, individual gold for Mahad, team silver for the women and individual bronze for Jess.