Tipperary Intermediate Cross Country titles for Catherine and Dermot

Moyne was the venue last Sunday for the County Junior and Intermediate Cross-Country Championships. Once again, the gods treated the athletes to summerlike conditions, while Moyne AC provided a very good course, which had everything in it.

INTERMEDIATE WOMEN
In the Intermediate women’s 5k race Catherine Fogarty of Dundrum went to the front from the whistle and made every stride a winning one as she came home as a very impressive and worthy champion. This was a brilliant performance by Catherine, who has shown a massive improvement this year over the country.

Then we had Mary Louise Ryan of Mooreabbey Milers, also running very well to win the silver medal impressively. The bronze medal was won by Sarah Whelan of Clonmel with another great performance. It was great running by Sarah as she also won the bronze medal at the County Novice in Galbally.

Sareen Walsh of Clonmel was 4th with Edel Delaney of Moyne 5th and Emily Leahy of Dundrum 6th. At this stage both Clonmel the defending Champions and Dundrum were on six points and all eyes were on the entrance to the field as to who would be next to finish. It was the Dundrum AC singlet of Mairead Julian that came into view, and she maintained that pace to finish 7th with Marina Quinlan of Clonmel finishing very strongly in 8th place. With three athletes to score, Dundrum were crowned Champions thus regaining the Cup last won in 2019.

Then we had the Mooreabbey Milers team of Sarah Wintgrove, making her club debut, 12th, Trish Ryan 14th and Patricia Blackburn 16th to win the Inter Club bronze medals.

INTERMEDIATE MEN
The men’s race over 8k was competitive. Shortly after the race started, Dermot Gorman of Carrick-on-Suir took up the pace and soon opened a nice lead from the chasing pack of the Dundrum duo of Barry Hartnett and Eamon Morrissey as well as the Fethard AC duo of Louis Rice and Emmet McNamara. Dermot came home a very worthy and convincing champion. As the athletes came into view with about 300m to the finish Barry had edged in front and kept the pace going to win the silver with Louis winning the bronze medal.

For the record Emmet McNamara of Fethard was fourth, with Eamonn Morrissey of Dundrum fifth and John Treacy of Thurles Crokes sixth. In the team event Dundrum were very impressive winners of the cup with their scoring team of Barry, Eamon, Colm Bradshaw seventh and Philly O’Dwyer 16th. Dundrum were regaining the cup last won in Moyglass in 2018.
The battle for the silver medals went down to the wire, and went down to countback. Here two teams, Mooreabbey Milers AC and Fethard AC both scored 52 points.

On countback the defending champions, Mooreabbey Milers had their fourth scorer in before the Fethard AC scorer and thus they won the silver medals. The Mooreabbey Milers team consisted of Ger Hanley 11th, Tom Blackburn 12th, Willie O’Donoghue 14th and Kevin Patrick Lenihan 15th.

Still, Fethard AC should be delighted with how their team competed at this level for the very first time when winning the bronze medals. Their scoring four were Louis, Emmet, Fintan Rice 13th and club chairperson John Hurley 32nd.

County Cross Country Relays
Thurles Crokes is the venue this Sunday for the County Cross Country relays. Last year the County Board introduced a senior Inter Club relay of four by 500m for mixed teams for all athletes over 16 years of age. It was a great success so hopefully that trend will continue in Thurles on Sunday.