Preview of the East Cork AC 3km Road Race - Tuesday 16th of October (7:30pm).

Intro - This will the first in a series of seven 3 km road races that will be held in Midleton in East Cork over the Winter months. The first race is on Tuesday, the 16th of October at 7:30pm and then every 3 weeks after that. It is open to all club and non-club athletes and you can do as many as you like. If however, you do 5 out of the 7, you will recieve a special T-Shirt.

Directions - See the image on the left. The circle shown at the top is the roundabout that is on the Midleton Bypass.

So, if you are coming from Cork, you need to take the 3rd exit and take the road South towards Whitegate. Almost immediately, you will pass a SHELL garage on the right. What you are looking for then is the 2nd turn right. The 1st one is a housing estate. Take the 2nd one and it will bring you down onto the 'Dark Road' which ends in a T-junction. Registration will be near here.

Course description - The course is basically 3 laps of a 1 km course. See the map...the start point, the 1km, 2km and finish points are shown. It can be a bit crowded at the start but it thins out after about 500 metres. By the way, you need to be carefull when you join the main road (bottom right hand corner on map). Even though you are running inside the hard shoulder, it is narrow at this point and it is easy to end up out on the main road.

Overall, the course is pretty flat. There is a short little uphill section when you join the main road (bottom right on map) but otherwise there's nothing.

Reasons to do it -

a) It's a good speed session and should help you improve your breathing, fitness levels and speed.

b) Good excuse to get in a run on a dark Winter evening!!

c) It is a very good way to test your fitness level. As the course is identical every 3 weeks, you can see how your training is going. For example, if you are training for the Ballycotton 10 in March, then you should see your times improve by the time of the last one in February.

Additional info -

a) Entry fee is €3

b) If you are still not sure of where it is, then try this link and zoom in and out to get your bearings.

c) If you did this race last year then you might be interested in the following. I have put together a chart showing the finishing times for everyone in alphabethical order. The link is HERE.

d) Last year, 240 runners took part in the series with 11 people doing all 7 races. I'd expect the numbers this year to be up a good bit.

e) Don't forget to wear a reflective bib!!