Notice : Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 14th June 2019

This 4 mile road race in Inniscarra is coming up on Friday, the 14th of June 2019...

The race HQ is the GAA grounds in Ballyanly which is to the north-west of Cork City...

It may not be the easiest of courses but it's on nice quiet country roads. On a nice sunny summer evening, it's a lovely spot for a race. The ease of access and proximity to Cork City is another major plus.

Preview...More information on the course can be seen HERE

The organisers have more info below...

Notice...Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 15th June 2018

This 4 mile road race in Inniscarra is coming up on Friday, the 15th of June 2018...

The race HQ is the GAA grounds in Ballyanly which is to the north-west of Cork City...

It may not be the easiest of courses but it's on nice quiet country roads. On a nice sunny summer evening, it's a lovely spot for a race. The ease of access and proximity to Cork City is another major plus.

Preview...More information on the course can be seen HERE

The organisers have more info below...

Notice...Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 16th June 2017

This 4 mile road race in Inniscarra is coming up on Friday, the 16th of June 2017...

The race HQ is the GAA grounds in Ballyanly which is to the north-west of Cork City...

It may not be the easiest of courses but it's on nice quiet country roads. On a nice sunny summer evening, it's a lovely spot for a race. The ease of access and proximity to Cork City is another major plus.

Preview...More information on the course can be seen HERE

The organisers have more info below...

Results of the Inniscarra 4 mile road race...Fri 17th June 2016

Another day, another race. This time it was the turn of the Inniscarra 4 mile road race on Friday the 17th of June with a modest crowd of 124 runners turning out.

The three main clubs by entry were Donoughmore AC 11, St.Finbarr's AC 11 and Eagle AC 10. Most of the others were twos and threes.

1    0:20:51    O'SHEA, Alan    Bantry AC    M    05:12.7
2    0:21:59    CRONIN, Mark    St. Finbarrs AC    M    05:29.7
3    0:22:52    LEHANE, Alan    St. Finbarrs AC    M    05:42.9
18    0:26:27    CRONIN, Niamh    St. Finbarrs AC    F40    06:36.6
25    0:27:36    WOLFE, Anne    St. Finbarrs AC    F40    06:53.9
28    0:28:16    FITZGERALD, Martine    unatt/Cork    F    07:03.9

The full results can be seen HERE

Photos...(Updated Sat 18th @13:27)
1) Ann Murphy of Eagle AC has a gallery of photos HERE
2) Mick Dooley has a small gallery HERE 

Notice...Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 17th June 2016

This 4 mile road race in Inniscarra is coming up on Friday, the 17th of June 2016...

The race HQ is the GAA grounds in Ballyanly which is to the north-west of Cork City...

It's probably not the easiest of courses but it's on nice quiet country roads. On a nice sunny summer evening, it's a nice spot for a race. The ease of access and proximity to Cork City is another major plus.

Preview...More information on the course can be seen HERE

The organisers have more info HERE

Results of the Inniscarra 4 mile road race...Fri 13th June 2014

 Another lovely sunny evening for yet another road race. A total of 110 runners turned out for this challenging 4 mile race in Ballyanly.

Alan O'Brien of Eagle AC...winner of the 2014 Inniscarra 4 mile road race

1 23:01    O'BRIEN, Alan    Eagle AC    M    05:45.2
2 23:20    O'SULLIVAN, Kieran    St. Finbarrs AC    M40    05:49.9
3 23:54    MURNANE, Chris    St. Finbarrs AC    M    05:58.4
20 28:35    O'CALLAGHAN, Rachael    unatt/Cork    F40    07:08.6
22 28:56    O'CONNOR, Adele    Eagle AC    F40    07:13.9
35 30:14    O'SHEA, Geraldine    St. Finbarrs AC    F45    07:33.4

The full results can be seen HERE

Race notice...Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 14th June 2013

This 4 mile road race in Inniscarra is coming up on Friday, the 14th of June 2013...

The race HQ is the GAA grounds in Ballyanly which is to the north-west of Cork City...

It's probably not the easiest of courses but it's on nice quiet country roads. The ease of access and proximity to Cork City is another major plus.

More details closer to the date...

Preview of the Inniscarra 4 mile road race - Fri 15th June 2012

This 4 mile road race near Inniscarra is ideally placed for any runner living near to Cork City.

Race Flyer...

Directions...

From the N20 Cork to Mallow/Limerick Road:
Exit for Blarney (R617) and drive through village and onto Tower. At the next T-junction, you'll come  to Cloghroe Church. Turn right onto the R579 for Kanturk and turn off left at Blairs Inn. Continue up the hill for 1 mile until you arrive at Inniscarra Community Centre.

Blairs Inn...turn off left here

From the N22 Ballincollig By-Pass / Cork to Killarney Road:
Follow the signs for Banteer / Kanturk R579. Having passed the Anglers Rest Pub take the road straight ahead for Kanturk R579. Follow the road for 7.6km passing through Cloghroe. Turn left at Blairs Inn passing the pub on your right hand side and continue up the hill for 1 mile until you arrive at Inniscarra Community Centre. There is plenty of parking available inside the grounds.

Inniscarra Community Centre

Entries for the race will be taken in the hall shown above...cost €8.

Course......The start of the race is just a short distance away from the GAA Grounds / Community Centre. Initially, it's very fast as you run steeply downhill but this changes very quickly as the road begins to climb just before the turn off left....

Once around the corner, the road continues to climb until roughly the half-mile mark when it eases off. A tough start but at least it's the worst hill out of the way.

From here, the road climbs but at a much more gentler pace. Eventually you come to the 1 mile mark...probably the toughest mile of the race but coming early on, it's not too bad.

The section between one and two mile marks is reasonably flat on a quiet road...

...it should be a fast mile.

At around the 2.3 mile mark, you come into the tiny village of Berrings...

You turn off left here and straight into the second hill. While it's steep, it's not very long. After this, the road flattens out again and starts to drop as you approach the 3 mile mark...a slow mile due to the hill.

From here, the road drops downhill until you join the lower road and start heading east towards the finish. With about 600 metres to go, the road drops rapidly before the last and final uphill section to the finish line.

Overall....Probably not the fastest of 4 mile courses with the three short uphill sections but it's a nice quiet spot for a race. The course is on country roads with very little traffic....ideal spot for an evening race.

Results of the Cork BHAA Inniscarra 4 Mile Road Race...Sun 21st Nov 2010

There was a modest turnout of 204 runners for this hilly 4 mile road race in Ballyanley near Inniscarra just to the west of Cork City.

The numbers for some of the previous years were...
2007...249,   2008...229,     2009...cancelled due to floods
The fact the Munster AAI Masters Cross Country Championships in Dungarvan were on the same day will of course have meant that a number of runners were missing. Allowing for that, the numbers would seem to be on par as previous years.
The full results can be found HERE

The next race on the Cork BHAA calendar is the Cork Simon 4 mile race at the Marina in Cork City on the 12th of December. This charity event involves running without your watch and guessing your finish time. Guess right and you win.

Results of the Cork BHAA 'Murphy Memorial' Inniscarra 4 Mile Road Race - Sun 23rd Nov 2008

That was one tough course! I remember that when we on the 1st hill after the start, I could hear someone on a PA system in the lead car saying 'It levels out after the next corner'. Sure enough, the corner came, the road levelled off and I thought 'That wasn't so bad'. I had forgotten though that a few corners later, it goes up again! Looking at a map, there is around 90 metres of ascent in this race which over 4 miles is a fair bit.

Yet for as hard as it was, it must be one of the nicest courses on the Cork BHAA calendar. Nice quiet country roads with no traffic.....a perfect location for a road race.

As always, this was another well organised race by the Cork BHAA. Somewhere in the region of 258 took part which is slightly up on last years figure of 249.

Results.......The full results are available HERE.

Here are the category results....

MURPHY MEMORIAL INNISCARRA COMMUNITY CENTRE 4-Mile Road Race (Cork BHAA).
1 R Zakis (GSK) 21:24; 2 T Murphy (Carrig Court) 22:03; 3 T O’Connor (Duhallow Business) 22:04; 4 S Simcox (Simcox Training) 22:11; 5 C O’Donovan (O’Donovan) 22:14; 6 K Wilmot (Bandon Tyres) 22:44; 7 L Reale (temp) 22:53; 8 B Hegarty (Pfizer-Little Island) 23:02; 9 J Meade (temp-reg) 23:07: 10 G Waugh (FAS) 23:10.

M40: F Wall (Sallyport) 24:13; 2 C McMahon (Phoenix Clinic) 24:48; 3 J Desmond (Horman Elect) 24:58.

M45: 1 M Bickerdike (Blarney School of Motoring) 23:33; 2 D Carroll (Blarney Woollen Mills) 24:54; 3 M Bulman (Army) 26:27.

M50: 1 J O’Driscoll (FAS) 26:18; 2 J Murphy (Cork Co Co) 28:18; 3 D Shine (Duhallow Business) 28:39.

M55: 1 P Twomey (UCC) 26:13; 2 D Kennedy (DMP) 27:01; 3 M Tobin (Carrig Court) 27:13.

M60: 1 P Gyves (ITW-Hi Cone) 29:00; 2 J Murray (HSE) 30:10.

Team: (Grade A) 1 Carrig Court 30; 2 Simcox Training 93; 3 Pfizer-Little Island 189. (Grade B) 1 Army 92; 2 UCC 126; 3 IPS 150. (Grade C) 1 ESB 212; 2 Blarney Woollen Mills 220; 3 Denis Cronin Elect 240.

Women: 1 C McCarthy (Ulster Bank) 25:09; 2 M Sweeney (Private Hospitals, F45) 25:46; 3 F Kirwan (Sensory Labs, F40) 27:03; 4 M Dinan (Leasing Co, F40) 27:04; 5 G Crowley (temp-reg) 28:27; 6 C Leahy (Musgrave) 28:36; 7 G Cotter (UCC) 29:04; 8 B Liston (Leisure World) 29:12; 9 C Buckley (temp-reg) 29:22; 10 N Goulding (temp-reg) 29:23.

F40: 3 G O’Shea (Cork Co Co) 29:29.

F45: 1 A Murphy (UCC) 30:21; 2 M Murphy (HSE) 30:39.

F50: 1 M Lyons (Flextronics) 34:45.

F55: 1 K O’Connell (Midleton News) 39:54.

F60: 1 M Dunne (Carrig Court) 36:12.

Team: (Grade A) 1 Musgrave 12; 2 Sensory Labs 16. (Grade B) 1 BoI 45; 2 Midleton News 51.

(..........with thanks to John Walshe of Ballycotton Running Promotions for the above results)

Preview of the Cork BHAA 4 mile road race in Inniscarra - Sun 23rd Nov 2008 (11:30am)

This is the 2nd last race on the Cork BHAA 2008 calendar and it's the last one in which there are category and team prizes.

How to get there...Let's say you are coming out from Cork on the Straight Road /Carrigrohane Straight. Take the right at the end of the road and cross the bridge over the Lee and go past the Angler's Rest pub (Shown as A above). By the way, if you are coming out via the Ballincollig Bypass, follow the signs for Kanturk / Blarney and you'll arrive at the same spot. After the Angler's Rest, you have a choice of 2 routes...

1) - At the junction just after the Angler's Rest, take the Right past the Garage. Stay on this road (R579) for several kms, go past the junction and Church in Cloghroe and look for the turn off left about 2 kms later.

2) - At the junction just after the Angler's Rest, stay left on the main road and you will bypass Ballincollig which is to your South. Carry on past the junction with the turn off for Ballincolling and the Inniscarra Bar on the corner (Shown as B on the map above). Take the right at the next major junction (If you go as far as the Inniscarra dam, you've gone too far). There should be a sign at the junction for Cloghroe. At the next T-junction, turn left and then look out for the turn off left.

Look for race directions on the day. Proceed up this road and park in the GAA grounds in Ballyanly.

Course Description...This is a hilly 4 mile course. You can forget about fast times, there are too many hills for that. However, despite the hills, the course is run on nice quiet country roads and it's a nice spot for a race.
The race itself starts down the road from the GAA grounds. Initially, you run downhill but soon, you turn off left and then there is a nasty drag uphill. Soon it eases off and then you are running on nice quiet roads.
Around the 2 mile mark, you come to the small village of Berrings. You turn left here at the church and you have another uphill section. It's not so severe but enough to put you into oxygen debt if you push too hard. After that, you're on flat or downhill sections.
Just in case you thought you were getting off lightly, the 3rd hill of note comes at the finish. In the last few hundred metres, you drop downhill and then you have to run about 200m up to the finish line which is just outside the GAA grounds.

Overall...As I said, forget about fast times but don't let the hills put you off. It's a nice area for a race and the country roads are quiet at that time on a Sunday morning. Refreshments are available in the GAA clubhouse after the race. After all those hills, you'll deserve it ;o)

I have put a map of the course up on the MapMyRun website in case you want to check out other ways to get there. The link is http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/ireland/cork/1129301821