The final domestic cross country event of 2025, the national novice cross country championships, took place in very difficult conditions at Abbottstown today. The event was hosted by Clonliffe Harriers who filled the role of LOC, many thanks to the almost 50 strong group from the club who gave up their Sunday to officiate and marshal. With the current spell of wet weather it was hardly a surprise that national cross country course in Abbottstown was turned to sticky mud as the day progressed. The novice championship was preceded by national juvenile uneven age championships (separate report), meaning that by the time the novice women took to the course there has been 10 races so the ground was nicely prepared for their 4000m race!
The Clonliffe women’s team has been making great strides forward in recent years, this year the squad has won both the Dublin and national intermediate titles, the Dublin 5 K Rd championships and took silver in the Dublin novice cross country in September. Today however was a big step up and the Clonliffe women responded brilliantly with a brave gutsy performance by every single team member. Hope Saunders, now living back home in Ireland, has been a brilliant addition to the squad, today was her 1st race in possibly 5 years and to say she hit the ground running is an understatement. Hope was always in the top 10 and put in a great shift to finish in 9th position, next in was Jess Gallagher an excellent 17th and then it was incredible packing that saw Niamh Quinn come home 35th, Jenny Johnston 36th and Grace Twomey 38th. Alibhe Morgan 45th, , Cindy Hickey 77th, young Aisling Kehoe 92nd and then another youngster Caoimhe Curran 126th. The reward for such guts was super silver with a scoring 4 of Hope, Jess, Niamh and Jenny. Hope also scored on the Dublin county team that won inter county gold. Winners were DSD on 66 points, Clonliffe 97 and Annadale Striders 115.
The final race of the day was the novice men’s team, the club has fielded a strong team and hopes were high that another set of medals would be coming to Santry. Mahad Mohamed Egaal ran a brilliant race and was neck and neck for silver right to the line but ended up, on a photo finish, taking bronze. 2nd scorer was Malcom Kiplagat who once again impressed all taking 22nd, Ben Coughlan was 25th and then having the race of his life Daragh Carter in 33rd as the team took well-deserved bronze medals behind Lagan Valley 1st and Nenagh Olympic 2nd. Both Mahad and Malcom took intercounty gold for Dublin. The scoring 4 were superbly backed up by Lorcan Benjacar, 46th, Damien Prendergast 62nd, Niall Sherlock 80th, Billy Stafford 125th, Greg Hosseny 136th, Ian McAlweeney 142nd, Andrew Gaffney 147th and Andrew D’Arcy 209th.
So another fine day for the Clonliffe cross country teams, national medals are hard earned so it is sweet when they are brought home. Well done to our athletes and their coaches. Next up on the cross country front is the Dublin intermediate and Dublin Masters cross country taking place in St Anne’s on January 4th.
Once again sincere thanks to the Clonliffe club members who volunteered for the day, without you, this event would not and could not have taken place.
Finally, some items that were left behind in the Clonliffe tent, a club singlet, body warmer, T-shirt and if you were the bits and bobs. These can be collected in the clubhouse this week however if not collected before next weekend they will be binned!