The all conquering Clonliffe senior men headed out west today in pursuit of the National half marathon title to Athenry, County Galway. With the men having gathered in the National Cross Country title and National Track and Field already this year and a strong looking team hopes were high that the title would come back to Santry. The top two Clonliffe scorers in the National Cross Country Sergiu Ciobanu and Gary O`Hanlon were joined in County Galway by Michael McDiarmada, recent winner of the Fingal 10k, and Ernie Ramsey. Sergiu and Gary warmed up last weekend by winning the Longford half and full marathons. Conditions were humid and by all accounts it was a pretty hilly course which was not conjusive to fast times. The Clonliffe lads all had good runs, Sergiu and Gary were in the lead pack until half way although Sergiu always going to be the fresher of the pair. Sergiu lead the team home in 2nd place (66.47) behind Paul Pollock (Annadale), Gary was 6th (69.26) and Michael third scorer 18th in 72.51. Ernie was 36th (75.25): 1st Clonliffe, 2nd City of Derry, 3rd Rathfarnham. Ailish Malone in 5th place lead the womens team home (85.57), Aoife O`Connor, in her first race for the black and amber was next scorer (85.56), the final scorer was Marie Byrne (88.52) as the girls collected National bronze behind Donore 1st and Raheny 2nd. Good runs also from Kerri Page, Jacqui Dunphy, Emma Harding, Aoife and Jeanette.
