With 33 top-ten places, including 6 individual victories, 8 team gold, 1 team silver and 1 team bronze medal finish, no wonder Mullingar Harriers easily retained the Shield for best juvenile Club at the annual Star of the Sea AC Cross Country Meeting in windy Stamullen, Co. Meath on Sunday 25th September. This marks the seventh year in a row that our juvenile athletes have won the Shield, an amazing record and achieved despite missing some key athletes in a few age-groups. There’s no doubt but Mullingar will be very hard to beat this cross country season.

The relatively low-key, relaxed and friendly nature of this by now traditional cross country season opener for the Club makes it ideal for newcomers and youngsters to try cross country running and many of our newcomers ran extremely well and were delighted to win medals. Teams of three were required to win points towards the trophy for best overall Club. A strong wind made conditions tough enough though thankfully the rain held off until later in the day, so the juvenile athletes were spared getting wet. As always, the organisers laid out an excellent course that was challenging but fair and proved a great early season test of everyone’s fitness.

Things got off to a really good start with the 500m for girls under 9 where newcomer Bea Drummond running her first race for Mullingar finished an excellent 3rd and led the team of Síofra Ní Léannacháin 4th and Aoife Swan to team silver. Colin Smith was our sole representative in the 500m for boys u/9 and was delighted to finish 3rd and win a prize. Shelly Smith was the runaway winner of the 800m for girls u/10 with a terrific sprint finish and with great support from Ciara Smith 6th, Jennifer Fidgeon 7th and Sadhbh Ní Léannacháin 10th, team victory was assured. Eoghan Quinn ran a blinder in the 800m for boys u/10 to take 3rd place and with Paul McCool 6th and Dylan Swan 7th also running so well, the boys easily won the team prize.

There was another close finish in the 1,500m for girls u/11 where Elysia Greene finished 2nd, just ahead of Maolíosa Ní Léannacháin 3rd and Amy Maxwell 4th and with support from Laura Gaffney and Elaine Gallagher also running well and finishing strongly, it was team gold yet again for Mullingar. John Whitelaw and Enda Gaffney battled hard to the finish of the 1,500m for boys u/11 with John just edging into 1st and Enda on his heels in 2nd, with Kevin Martin providing the vital third score to ensure Mullingar won yet another team gold.

In the 2,000m for girls u/12, Alisha Martin showed great determination and with a fine sprint finish crossed the line in 2nd, with Daria Fidgeon 6th, Caoimhe Gaffney 7th, Sarah Maloney 8th and Caitriona Kennedy packing well to win the team gold. Conor McHugh ran a great race and was pleased with his 2nd place finish in the 2,000m for boys u/12 with Aaron Flanagan also finishing strongly and a pity we didn’t have a third runner as team medals would have been a certainty.

On to the 2,500m for girls u/13 where Alanna Bate ran a fantastic race and in what proved to be the best and most closely fought sprint finish of the day, was just edged into 2nd place with mere yards to go. With Niamh Quinn also sprinting furiously to cross the line in 3rd and Méabh McNulty finishing strongly too in 9th, it was team gold again for Mullingar. Dorothy Bane was our sole representative in the 3,000m for girls u/14 where she ran a solid race over the hilly course and though she finished out of the prizes, was still pleased with her performance.

No shortage of Mullingar athletes in the 3,000m for boys u/14 where we had enough for two teams plus a spare if needed! Cormac Dalton and Patrick Shaw took control of the race from early on and cheered on by the vocal Mullingar supporters opened up a good lead over the rest. Cormac really had to work hard to shake off the late challenge of Patrick over the last few hundred metres and just had enough to spare to win the race with Patrick a close 2nd. These two talented athletes have great futures in athletics ahead of them. With Declan Brady finishing strongly in 4th, Luke Lenehan 9th, followed by Eoghan Gallagher, Kevin Giles and Niall Brady, it was 1st and 3rd team prizes for Mullingar. Niall Brady developed a problem with his shoulder midway through the race but bravely ran on to the finish despite the pain so he wouldn’t let the team down. That’s the kind of team spirit that the Club likes to see.

Aisling Moody had no team in the 3,500m for girls u/15 where she gave a great display of front running to win by a large margin and put down a clear marker of intent for the season ahead. It was a clear victory too for Glen Gaffney in the 3,500m for boys u/15, where Mervyn Harris put in a terrific sprint finish over the last 200m to clinch 4th place and an individual medal. The Club’s sixth and final individual victory in the juvenile races came courtesy of Linda Conroy in the 4,000m for girls u/17 where she dominated the race from start to finish and with Lorraine Daly finishing strongly in 3rd and Lorna Moody in 5th providing great team support, came Mullingar’s eighth team gold. The final race of the juvenile programme was the 4,000m for boys u/17 where Philip Giles ran well but finished out of the medals.

After the final juvenile race, attention turned to the women and men races. The women competed over 4,000m and this was a combined junior, senior and master race. First to finish for the Club in 1st place overall was Mary Scully to win the senior prize. Next in for Mullingar was Michelle O’Halloran in 7th, who had a really good race and was delighted to finish 2nd in her master category. Vera McCool was next to finish and provided the vital third score to secure 2nd place in the combined senior/master category, as well as taking 2nd place in her individual master category. Amie Giles and Anna Ryan also competed very well in the junior ranks but unfortunately we had no third runner to make up a team.

The rain that had held off all day finally came down heavy for the last event of the day, the 6,000m for junior, senior and master men where Vinny Connolly showed real spirit and determination to finish first for Mullingar, winning the junior race, followed by Paddy Kelly, Gavin Doran (2nd junior), Kevin Baker, Martin Lyons, Matt Glennon (2nd master), Adam Daly, Kieran Nolan, Justin Murtagh and Paul McCool who all battled bravely against the wind and driving rain. The Mullingar men's team won the combined senior/junior team prize. The race showed that Mullingar should be able to mount a serious challenge for honours in the Leinster Novice at the end of October.

Last Sunday we witnessed some really good individual performances, especially from some of our newcomers, but also some great team running, which is essential for cross country success and will give everyone a lot of confidence ahead of the Leinster Championships. It was particularly good to see many of the newcomers winning medals. Finally, a big thank you to the many parents and supporters who traveled to Meath to support our athletes, especially the very young ones, and stayed on to the bitter end, despite the wind and rain.