Aoife Cooke of Youghal AC wins National Intermediate Cross Country title

The National Intermediate Cross Country Championships were held in Galway last weekend and Aoife Cooke of Youghal AC won the women's title. This adds to the National Novice title that she won in December of 2015 in Dungarvan.

Aoife Cooke's victory came almost 39 years after her aunt, Mary Dempsey (now Sweeney), won the same race over a snow-covered course at Rockwell College in February of 1978.

Aoife also led the Cork team to Gold with a score of 27 points, two points ahead of Dublin on 29.

As you can see below, East Cork AC and Youghal AC turned out in numbers for this race and Youghal managed to take a team Silver.

ID Time PositionName Club Name Club Team County Team
274 20:01 1 Aoife Cooke Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork

207 21:10 5 Fiona Santry East Cork A.C. Cork
276 21:43 9 Ruth Millerick Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork
273 22:33 12 Evelyn Cashman Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork

272 22:50 15 Deirdre Ansbro Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork
206 22:57 16 Eadaoin O'Neill East Cork A.C. Cork
278 23:18 18 Louise O'Brien Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork

275 23:50 23 Julie Keneally Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C. Cork

211 24:20 26 Michelle Ahern East Cork A.C.

279 25:18 33 Margaret O'Mahony Youghal A.C. Youghal A.C

Club Team Points
Place Club Positions Points
2 Youghal A.C. 1, 9, 12, 15 37

County Team ...Points
1 Cork 1, 5, 9, 12 ...27

In the men's race, East Cork AC were in action and managed to field a full team to take a very respectable 5th place.

43 29:41 14 Kenneth Kelleher East Cork A.C. East Cork A.C.
59 31:17 26 Andrew Sheehan Leevale A.C.
38 31:19 27 Shane Harrington East Cork A.C. East Cork A.C
39 31:39 33 Brian Harty East Cork A.C. East Cork A.C
44 32:26 44 Kevin O'Leary East Cork A.C. East Cork A.C.

5 East Cork A.C. 14, 27, 33, 44 ...118

As you can see above, there were 5 men from Cork taking part. As six were required for a county team, Cork were not presented in the inter county competition.

Full results as always on the Athletics Ireland website.

Irish Sports Council announce athlete funding for 2016...

A few weeks back, the Irish Sports Council announced the following grants for Irish athletes....

NGB Applicant Category Recommendation

2016 Total...Athletics Ireland... 

Robert Heffernan... Podium €40,000...(2015 = €40k, 2014 = €40k, 2013 = €40k, 2012 = €40k).

Fionnuala McCormack... World Class €20,000....(2015 = €20k, 2014 = €20k, 2013 = €20k, 2012 = €20k)

Ciaran O'Lionaird... World Class €20,000...(2015 = €20k, 2014 = €12k, 2013 = €20k, 2012 = €20k).

Mark English... World Class €20,000...(2015 = €20k, 2014 = €12k, 2013 = €0k, 2012 = €0k).

Paul Robinson... World Class €20,000...(2015 = €20k, 2014 = €12k, 2013 = €0k, 2012 = €0k).

Thomas Barr... World Class €20,000...(2015 = €20k, 2014 = €0k, 2013 = €0k, 2012 = €0k)

Mens 4x4 Relay... World Class €20,000...New

Brian Gregan... International €12,000...(2015 = €12k, 2014 = €12k, 2013 = €12k, 2012 = €0k).

Brendan Boyce... International €12,000...(2015 = €12k, 2014 = €12k, 2013 = €12k, 2012 = €0k).

Alex Wright... International €12,000...New

Ciara Everard... International €12,000...New

Ciara Mageean... International €12,000 (2015 = €12k)

Total €220,000

The funding levels are usually based on the performance of previous years as opposed to just 2016.


https://www.irishsportscouncil.ie/High_Performance/Carding-/june.pdf

Leevale AC to develop €1.7 million athletics training facility

It was announced recently that Leevale AC plan to develop a new high performance athletics centre for the club in Cork City. This is a major investment for the club as the venture is expected to cost €1.7 million and will be paid from a a building fund which was set up back in the 1990's and some capital grants.

The new athletics centre will be located in what was the old Top Car building on Farranlea Road.

Old Top Car building with the new Leevale facility above

The map below shows the location of the new Leevale athletics centre. It's is near Victoria Cross, Dennehy's Cross and the County Hall.

The main sports hall inside has dimensions of 31.6m x 26.7m and the floor plan is shown below....

As you can see, most of the major disciplines of track and field are catered for. There is also a separate gym area as shown below.

As you can see from the artist's impressions, it should be a fantastic facility and should enable Leevale AC to compete at the highest levels.

Further reading...
Article on the Evening Echo website.
Article on the Irish Examiner website.

Leak of Secret Athletics Database shows widespread doping..

Over the last few months, there have been serious allegations of doping in the world of athletics. A German TV documentary claimed that doping in athletics was widespread in Russia and that the governing body the IAAF did very little about it.

Now, a secret IAAF database has been leaked to the media. It shows tests 12,000 blood tests from around 5,000 athletes in the years 2001 to 2012, including numerous Olympic and World champions. It was passed on by German and British media to leading blood doping experts for their review.

Here are some of the quotes and headlines coming out of this story....

Leading experts: “It is alarming how widespread doping in athletics is”

"A total of 800 athletes in disciplines from 800 metres to the marathon register values which, according to the definition of the Biological Passport of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) are regarded as suspicious or even highly suspicious."

"At World Championships and Olympic Games between 2001 and 2012, every third medal was won by athletes, for whom one or even both experts had identified suspicious blood values in the database. For every sixth medal winner at least one of the scientists is even as good as certain that the athlete has doped in the course of his/her career."
“Often two out of the three medalists had probably engaged in blood doping during their career. In one event the entire podium was comprised of athletes, who in my opinion had most probably doped at some point in their career”,

 “For the IAAF to have harvested millions of dollars from the broadcasting of athletics competitions around the world year after year yet only devotes a relative pittance of those funds towards anti doping, when they must have seen the terrible truth of what lay beneath the surface, is in my opinion a shameful betrayal of their primary duty to police their sport and to protect the clean athletes.”

A top UK athlete is among seven Britons with suspicious blood scores.

Ten medals at London 2012 were won by athletes who have dubious test results.

Russia emerges as "the blood testing epicentre of the world" with more than 80% of the country's medals won by suspicious athletes, while Kenya had 18 medals won by suspicious athletes.

Stars such as Britain's Mo Farah and Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt recorded no abnormal results.

Athletes are increasingly using blood transfusions and EPO micro-doses to boost the red cell count.

Russia had the largest number of suspicious readings, with 30% of its athletes in the data registering abnormal blood tests. Ukraine and Turkey were hot on its heels with 28% and 27%. Kenya was 14th with 11%, while Great Britain was 47th with 4%.

For more info, go to....
Athletics Illustrated
BBC Sport

Statement from the IAAF... http://www.iaaf.org/news/iaaf-news/ard-anti-doping-response

Update.....If you have any interest in athletics then you should watch the latest video from German television. It's pretty explosive stuff.....Click HERE

Results of Round 3 of the John Buckley Sports Graded Track & Field League...Mon 8th June 2015

The 3rd round of the John Buckley Sports Graded Track & Field was held at the CIT track on Monday the 8th of June 2015.

The results of this and previous rounds can be seen at http://corkrunning.blogspot.com/p/cork-graded-t-league.html

Results & photos of the Irish Universities Track & Field Championships...Apr 2015

The IUAA Track & Field Championships were held in Belfast over the weekend and a number of athletes from UCC, CIT and other colleges in Munster traveled north to take part.

The full results can be seen HERE

Ian O'Sullivan of CIT has a gallery of photos HERE

Bandon AC Open Sports...Sun 7th Sept 2014

Bandon Athletic Club were formed back in 1964 and in 2014, they celebrate their 50th anniversary. To commemorate this, the club is holding an Open Sports Day in Bandon Town Park.

From Bandon AC......The Open Sports Day is being hosted to celebrate our 50th birthday and to coincide with the first open sports held in Bandon back in 1964. 

We are hoping for a competitive and fun day for both juvenile and senior athletes. Admission is €5 for adults, €3 for juvenilles/juniors and €10 for a family which covers entry to any of the events. Junior and Senior pre-entry is available which will help the organisers but athletes can simply enter on the day if necessary. The full order of events and pre-entry can be found on www.bandonac.org

The day starts with juvenile events at 12 pm with the first senior events starting at 2pm. Linking back to a tradition when cycling was a core part of many athletic events, there are 3 cycle events included on the programme which should make for an interesting change.

Please note that this was originally due to be held on the 24th of August but had to postponed due to wet weather.

Further info...(note the times are the same as originally planned for the 24th)
a) List of events
b) Order of events
c) Entry Form

The Open Sports will be held in Bandon Town Park....see map below. This is located on the Macroom Road.

From the Cork road...Drive in as far as the T-junction and turn right and cross over the river. Then left and a right up the hill at the next junction. Just keep driving and the Town Park will be on your left.

The Bandon AC website can be seen at http://www.bandonac.org/

IAAF to reintroduce 4 year bans for doping...

The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) has announced that from 2015, athletes found guilty of using banned substances will be given a four year ban instead of the current two. It was cut to two years in 1997 to bring it in line with other international sports bodies but it has meant that some athletes could cheat and still be ready for the next Olympics.

In a statement, the IAAF said..."The IAAF has an ethical obligation to the overwhelming majority of athletes and officials who believe in clean sport. The new Wada code, which will come into force on 1 January, 2015, will reflect our firm commitment to have tougher penalties and the IAAF will return to four-year sanctions for serious doping offences. As a leader in this fight, the IAAF has built and delivers a programme that is well resourced, far reaching, sophisticated and increasingly able to detect and remove from the sport those who breach our anti-doping rules."

IAAF vice-president Sergey Bubka said..."It's the only way to succeed - we must be harsh, we must be strong. Clearly today it's unpleasant to see some positive cases but we can see systems start to work, and really well. We will continue to fight. We understand it is tough but we are getting stronger and we will continue to do our best."

This new move from the IAAF will be welcomed by most people involved in athletics. A four year ban is a good part of any athletes career and considering that the Olympic cycle is every four years then this is a real deterrent.

Irish Sports Council announce 2013 Athletics grants

The Irish Sports Council have just announced their grants to athletes for 2013. This time around, Rob Heffernan is the only person to secure the maximum €40,000 grant while Derval O'Rourke drops down to €12,000.

2013 Funding
€40,000 - Podium : Robert Heffernan Athletics
€20,000 - World Class : Ciaran O'Lionard Athletics, Deirdre Ryan, Fionnuala Britton
€12,000 - International : Brendan Boyce, Tori Pena, Derval O'Rourke, Linda Byrne, Mark Kenneally, Brian Gregan, Laura Reynolds, Ava Hutchinson, Caitriona Jennings, Jessie Barr

2012 Funding
€40,000 – Podium: Olive Loughnane, Derval O'Rourke, Robert Heffernan, David Gillick
€20,000 - World Class: Ciaran O'Lionard, Deirdre Ryan, Fionnuala Britton, Paul Hession
€12,000 - International: Alistair Cragg, Stephanie Reilly, Linda Byrne, Mark Kenneally, Brendan Boyce, Joe Sweeney, Ciara Mageean, Joanne Cuddihy, Ava Hutchison

Olympic Council of Ireland announce Irish Olympic Team...

The Olympic Council of Ireland have just announced those who have qualified for the Irish team for the 2012 Olympics in London.

This is the athletics team in alphabetical order...
ATHLETICS    
Jessie Barr    Womens 4 x 400m Relay
Claire Bergin    Womens 4 x 400m Relay
Brendan Boyce    Mens 50K Road Walk
Linda Byrne    Womens Marathon
Fionnuala Britton    Womens 10,000m
Michelle Carey    Womens 4 x 400m Relay
Alistair Cragg    Mens 5,000m
Catriona Cuddihy    Womens 4 x 400m Relay
Joanne Cuddihy    Womens 400m
Colin Griffin    Mens 50K Road Walk
Marian Heffernan    Womens 4 x 400m Relay
Rob Heffernan    Mens 20K and 50K Road Walk
Paul Hession    Mens 200m
Ava Hutchinson    Womens Marathon
Catriona Jennings    Womens Marathon
Mark Kenneally    Mens Marathon
Olive Loughnane    Womens 20K Road Walk
Ciaran O’Lionaird    Mens 1,500m
Derval O’Rourke    Womens 100m Hurdles
Tori Pena    Womens Pole Vault
Stephanie Reilly    Womens 3,000m Steeplechase
Deirdre Ryan    Womens High Jump

High Jump...Dick Fosbury and 'the flop'

For the majority of people, the high jump has always had one particular style...the 'Fosbury Flop'. The athlete essentially jumps over the bar head first with their shoulders and back closest to the ground with their legs trailing behind and then flipped upwards at the last moment. It may seem that it was always this way but prior to 1968, high jump techniques were completely different.

In the early part of the 20th century, the 'scissors' was popular but this was largely replaced later with variations of the 'straddle'. This technique was the dominant style until the Olympic Games in Mexico in 1968 when a relatively unknown US high jumper called Dick Fosbury took the Gold.....(video HERE although it's a bit long)

The Guardian had an interesting piece on the 'Fosbury Flop' on Tuesday and how it changed the high jump forever.....Article HERE

In this interview, Dick Fosbury talks about the technique named after him and it's impact on the sport...

Irish Athletics News...European Team Champs & Racewalking News

The European Team Championships were held recently (18-19th June) in Izmir, Turkey. Ireland finished in 10th place of twelve with 224.5 points, ahead of Slovenia with 200.5 points, securing a place in the First League for 2013 when Athletics Ireland hopes to host the event.

The top individual performance was by Fionnuala Britton (Kilcoole AC) who finished second in the 5000m in a time of 15:37.78.In the Sprint hurdles, European Silver Medallist, Derval O’Rourke (Leevale AC) ran 13.11 to finish in fourth place.

Interview with Derval O'Rourke....


Racewalking........Updated Sun 26th June
The 10th Dublin International Grand Prix of Race Walking takes place in the Phoenix Park on Sunday, the 26th of June.

Ireland’s world championship silver medallist Olive Loughnane who lives in Coachford in Cork will be taking part in the womens 20 kms race. Also taking part is Rob Heffernan will be looking for a victory on home soil but will be faced with a field of athletes from 22 countries in a 50 plus strong field in the 20km.

Fourth in both the European 20km and 50km championships last season, Rob will use the event as part of his fine tuning for Daegu at the end of August. Olympian Jamie Costin hopes to do 10km on his return from injury.

Leitrim’s Colin Griffin is taking part in the 50km in search of the A standard for the London Olympics.

According to Athletics Ireland......."The event is held under a European Athletics Permit, is a points scoring competition for the IAAF Challenge and incorporates the National 20km Walk Championship, an international match between Ireland, England, Switzerland, Holland and Denmark and also the Paul Nihill Shield match between Ireland and England in the juvenile age groups. This match will see Kate Veale (West Waterford AC) take part in the U18 3km ahead of her attack on an IAAF World Youths medal in the middle of July."

Athletes from over 30 countries will take part in the event.

Update...Sun 26th June 2011.........Results

Olive Loughnane finished 2nd in a time of 1.31.44 in the 20k walk to Liu Hong of China, who won in 1.29.44. Hong won the bronze medal behind Loughnane at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin. Jamy Amarilis Franco Nunez of Guatamala was third in 01:32:48.

Robert Heffernan had to unfortunately pull out at 6km as a precautionary measure due to a tight hamstring.

Photos.......There is a very large gallery of photos on the West Waterford AC website

Breakdown of Cork Athletic Clubs by size...

At the end of May, Athletics Ireland released their current membership details based on the numbers in individual clubs. While it's interesting in itself, it's only when you extract some of the data and graph it that it becomes clearer.

Basically, I took the figures for each club and removed all of the juveniles so that I was left with adults only...i.e. those that are most likely to be taking part in some sort of road race or similar event. Now while some clubs are more track and field orientated, the majority are involved in some sort of running.

In terms of adult membership, there are 4 main clubs. Midleton AC are the largest with 188. St.Finbarrs AC based in Cork City is 2nd with 176 having shown strong growth in recent times. Bantry AC in west Cork have a very active Fit4Life programme and they are 3rd largest with 171. Bandon AC are 4th with 149 with another active Fit4Life programme.

Any club with less than 20 adult members is not shown above.



Results of the AAI National Intermediate & Masters Cross Country Championships...Sun 6th Feb 2011

The national Intermediate and Masters Cross Country Championships took place in Dublin on Sun 6th of Feb in what were very muddy conditions. See video below...


In the Intermediate Mens race, Michael Herlihy of North Cork AC finished in 2nd place. Michael is a former winner of the Cork City Marathon.

In the Womens Intermediate race, 4 of the top 10 women were from Cork...
Sinead O'Connor (Leevale AC)...3rd, Davina Fenton (St.Finbarrs A C) ...4th, Annette Quaid (Leevale AC)...5th and Niamh Walsh (Youghal AC)...6th. These fine performances helped Leevale AC take the 1st team prize and for Cork to finish 1st county.

In the Womens Masters race, Carmel Crowley of Bandon AC put in an outstanding performance to finish 2nd, just 2 seconds ahead of former Olympian Pauline Curley.

Other winners were Carmel Parnell of Leevale AC finishing first in the F55 section while Ann Donnelly of St.Finbarr's AC finished 1st in F50.

Results in PDF Format...
Intermediate Men....Intermediate Women...
Masters Men....Masters Women

Profile of Athletic Clubs in Cork...

This post is for those of you out there who are the PRO's/Secretarys of the various Cork athletic clubs. If you look through the results of any of the local races, you'll notice that a lot of runners are not members of any club. I could well imagine that from the point of view of someone starting off, they might think that athletic clubs are only for 'serious' or 'fast' athletes. They would not realise that most clubs have members just like them. Or perhaps there are those who are doing their own thing and feel there is no need for them to join a club.

So, why not promote your own club and see if you can attract a few new members? I'll put up the info that you will supply here on this blog as a seperate post. If your club has a website, I'll link to it in the post. If you don't have a website, I can put up a page on another website with your club details. It may not be as good as a full blown website but at least it will give your club a space on the net where people can find out some information about you.

Perhaps you could supply your club information using the following guidelines...

Club Name : ??????

Town / Catchment area : ????????

Members : How many Seniors (Adults - %Men, %Women), Juniors?

Activities : What are your members involved in? Road Races? Track races? Other track & field events? Cross Country? Races overseas?

Training : Do your members meet for training runs on the road? Where? Do you do speedwork at a track? Where? Other types of training?

Events : Do you host a road race during the year? Other events?

Contact Name : Name, Phone number, E-mail address (Optional)

Website : ???

Any other info : ???

If you want to supply a group photo of your club members or anything like that, you can. Send on the info to my e-mail address which is shown at the bottom of the right hand column.

New webpage for the Kilnaboy 10 Mile Road Race...
Over the last weekend, I put together a new webpage for the Kilnaboy 10 mile road race thanks to the information supplied by Vincent McCarthy of Kilnaboy AC. This race will be the 4th and final race in the Munster 10 mile 'Classic' series.

The Kilnaboy 10 webpage can be seen at this LINK.

The Kilnaboy 10 Mile Road Race takes place on Sunday, the 13th of April at 2pm. Kilnaboy is located just North of Ennis in Co.Clare.

Belgooly Athletic Club launch new website...
I was asked by John Copithorne of Belgooly AC some time ago to put together a website for their club. I decided to use a blog format as it will be easier for them to maintain and all the information that they requested can be displayed on it.

You can see their new website at... http://belgoolyac.blogspot.com/

Belgooly AC are a small club who concentrate on track and field events mainly for children and teenagers. They have members from both Cork City and County. They train at the CIT track in Bishopstown every Tuesday and Thursday night between 7 and 8 pm and down in Crosshaven on Wednesday nights. So, if you know of anyone in that age group who might be interested in starting athletics, you should contact John Copithorne. His details are listed on the new website.