A great day for the Parish.

Stephen Bateson reports: The 2^nd Sunday of October heralded the beginning of another Cross Country season. In unseasonably barmy weather conditions 2 large Clonliffe Teams took to the Line of the Dublin Novice Races.

The women team had 15 entries that competed over a distance of 4.5 K. There were couple of ladies making their Cross country debuts for the team. Over the first lap Clonliffe ladies packed well and were well in the hunt for team medals with a lap to go. Over the final lap Julie Larkin had a stormer to finish in 5^th, with  an equally impressive Hannah Browne running her best race in a number of years to finish 9^th, close behind was Aisling Killiea who ran a very mature and measured race to finish 12^th and then Jools Hughes in 14^th showing great determination over the final 200 m to hold her place and showing the strength that she has from her half marathon training.  The Team finished 3^rd on 40 points, 7 behind Crusaders in 2^nd and DCH in first on 29 points.

The other Clonliffe team Members were

Aoife O’Reilly                   17^th

Sarah Hawkshaw               19^th

Jenny Johnston               22^nd

Siobhan Devaney               28^th

Aoife O’Sullivan               31^st

Chloe Heaslip                   49^th

Ines Pinto                         54^th

Orla Deighan                    55^th

Siobhan McCarthy               57^th

Paul Horgan                     61^st

Yvonne McDonough               69th

The Men’s Team have had a number of frustrating years at this event being close on a number of occasions but finally today the Novice title was captured to go with the road title that was won in March, There were 14 men toeing the line before the 6k course. There were a number of the team making their Novice debut for the club.  From the gun there was 4 men in the leading group. These 4 stayed in the leading group until the final 2 laps and with 1 lap to go Fintan Kerins and Jack Maughan  were in the hunt with Niall Carbery and Sean Owens Heaslip just slightly further back. Fintan held on for 2^nd and Jack Maughan finished strongly in 4^th. Niall Carbery came in 10th with Sean Owens Heaslip coming home in 12^th. With 28 points the team were clear winners from DSD in 2^nd with 45 points and DCH with 61 points in 3^rd. The team was backed up strongly  by

Paul Keenan                     23^rd

Cian Murray                     41^st

Oren Kenny                      46^th

Ronan Donohoe              49^th

Eoin Maguire                   51^st

Peter Bissett                    64^th

Jack Woods                      85^th

Andrew Gaffney              87^th

Ryan Sheridan                 89^th

Fergal O’Shea                  95th