With eleven Club athletes in action for their Schools and Colleges in the All-Ireland Schools Cross Country Finals in Cork IT on Saturday 13th March there was plenty of interest for many connected with the Club to make it worthwhile in taking the long journey to Cork. As well as individual and team honours at stake was the chance to be selected for the Ireland teams to compete at the Schools Cross Country International in Cornwall in two weeks time and by day’s end, no less than four Club athletes had booked their places to Cornwall, namely Linda Conroy, Ciara Hewson, Lorraine Daly and Shane Fitzsimons.

The course in Cork IT was quite flat with some sharp corners and was very firm underfoot, which necessitated some hasty last minute changes to shorter spikes before the start. Otherwise, conditions were perfect for racing and spectators too enjoyed the crisp spring air in Cork. Competing for Mercy Kilbeggan, Linda Conroy put in a tremendous performance in the Junior Girls 2,500m with a top-ten finish and secured selection on the Ireland team to get the day off to the best possible start. On any other day, Padraig Moran (St. Mary’s, Mullingar) would have been odds-on favourite to win an individual medal in the Junior Boys 3,500m let alone make the Ireland team, but a bout of illness robbed him of his best. He nonetheless turned in a brave gutsy performance and by not giving in to what must have been a tremendous urge to drop out he pushed on for the sake of the team and what a good decision that turned out to be. With Ryan Blundell running a brilliant race to finish 14th in his first Schools All-Ireland and only a few seconds off possible selection on the Ireland team, followed very closely by Nathan Smith in 16th and great team running also from Ben McCabe and Eoin Lynam, the St. Mary’s boys won the team title, the first time ever for the School and is a great testament and just reward to the great work put in with this young team by St. Mary’s teacher Damien Lawlor. The winning margin was only 3 points and if Padraig had dropped out, the team would have finished fourth and gone home empty-handed, which would have been a tragedy after all their hard work in training over the past months.

In the Intermediate Girls 3,500m Ciara Hewson (Maynooth PPS) turned in a stunning performance, moving rapidly through the field after a slow enough start and with a final surge in the closing stages that took her into 3rd place and an individual medal. Club-mate, Lorraine Daly (Mercy Kilbeggan) meanwhile was also putting in a sterling performance to finish 7th and richly deserves her place on the Ireland team along with Ciara. Running out of age and over a considerably longer distance than being used to is tough, but that’s what faced Shane Fitzsimons (St. Joseph’s, Rochfortbridge) and Thomas Lynn (St. Finian’s, Mullingar) in the Intermediate Boys 5,000m where Shane ran a clever race and by sticking to the careful pre-race plan, took him into a top-ten finish and a place on the Ireland team. Thomas also ran extremely well to finish well up the field and no doubt will be looking forward to the same event this time next year when he should be challenging for honours.

We had plenty to cheer about in the Senior Boys 6,000m with Jake Byrne (St. Joseph’s, Rochfortbridge), Vincent Connolly (Killucan) and Thomas Fagan (Moate CC) in action and though all three ran very competitively, they finished out of the prizes but were still delighted to be competing on the All-Ireland stage.

Apart from the great team gold for St. Mary’s Mullingar, it was great from a Westmeath perspective also to see Our Lady's Bower in Athlone win team bronze medals in the Senior and Intermediate Girls events too. All in all a great day’s racing in Cork much enjoyed by the many friends and supporters of Mullingar that traveled in number.