After their heavy schedule last weekend in the Munster Indoors on the previous week Conor McCarthy and Ryan Vickers competed in the Munster Schools Cross Country championships in Waterford. Ryan finished 2nd in the Minor Boys qualified for will for to the All-Irelands. Ryan led the St. Brendans Killarney to 3rd place in the team competition. Congratulations also to their coach Arthur Fitzgerald for some excellent results in the team competitions where they medalled in 3 out of 4 competitions. Conor despite conceding almost 2 years to some of his competitors finished in 32nd of almost 80 runners in the Intermediate category.
Michael O
Connor competed in the Killarney parkrun walking it in an impressive 31
minutes. Michael who along with Jerome Foley and Jim O’Shea will compete in
European Masters Championships at the end of the month. Laura Bradley was the 1st
female across the line.
Our under
16 relay team were in action in the Munster championships in Nenagh on the 2nd.
Samuel Scroope started running an excellent 1st leg against a very
strong Leevale team. He handed over to Conor McCarthy who along with Isaac
Vickers ran excellent legs that ended with Ryan taking the baton with a 4 metre
lead which he held comfortably to the end. They finished in a time over 1 min
40 sec just over a second outside the existing record. They now head to Athlone
in 3 weeks’ time for the All-Ireland finals. Well done to the 4 lads and coach
Jerome Foley.
At the
All-Ireland Schools Cross Country Championships Ryan Vickers came 3rd
in the Minor Boys race
We had a
number of medallists at the Munster Indoor Schools championships on the 13th
Ryan Vickers won the Minor boys 60 m and followed this up with another
gold in the 400 metres. Roisin Daly came 2nd in the Intermediate 60m
and Isaac Vickers won the Intermediate 600 metres. To finish a very successful
day off Niamh and Kevin O’Shea both came 2nd in the Shot Putt.
We had 3
athletes competing in the European Masters Championships in Torun in Poland on
the week of the 16th. Jim O’Shea came home with a silver in the Long Jump and
Bronze in the High Jump. He narrowly missed out on a medal in the Pentathlon
where a stumble at the hurdles cost him valuable points. Michael O’Connor
competed in the 3K walk finishing second only 5 seconds behind the winner from
Slovenia. He came 3rd in the 5K walk and along with St. Brendan’s
David Kissane was part of the Irish team that won gold ahead of Germany and
France. Jerome Foley was the busiest of our athletes competing in the 200, 400
and 800 as well as being part of the 4 x 200 relay team. Jerome’s best
performance was in the 400 where he finished 3rd in his heat but
unfortunately only 2 qualified for the semi-final.
The younger
generation of athletes were competing in Athlone where our u-16 4 x 200 team
were competing the All-Irelands. The team of Samuel Scroope, Conor McCarthy and
the 2 Vickers brothers were running in the 2nd heat. They were
pipped for 1st place by Dublin outfit Mid-Sutton. The final was a
very tight affair with the lead changing hands my times during the 4 laps. Any
one of 5 teams could have won the race, our lads finished in an excellent 3rd
knocking over 3 seconds off their time from the Munster championships.