The big winners were Ray Dunne(guest of Clonliffe), GPS winner and Darren Reilly, fastest man. Eoin Murray reports : The Grand Prix presentation took place in club bar last night after the Mc Donald cup. The Post race function was extremely enjoyable which included a lovely Thai chicken curry, a few pints and some of the athletes got up to sing. Presentations were also held for the Club 10 mile championships and the Noel Guiden sponsored mile race.
The series was very successful with 80 athletes taking part in the series in all, there were 12 races in total in the series, with the distances ranging from 800m to ten mile, great value for €30. Thanks to everyone who competed, and to all the officials who helped out. Thanks to Paddy and Caroline Tuite for the tea. cake and biscuits that were on hand after every race.
Thank you also to the sponsors of the races who have supported the series over the years. There are a few races in the series that are not sponsored if anyone is interested in taking one of them. Thanks also to Fred Connolly for sponsoring the fastest athlete prize.
Maurice Ahern started proceedings with a short speech before the presentations began. Maurice presented the 10 mile prizes and called on Pat Bonass to present the Noel Guiden mile prizes. Maurice then called on club president Paddy Marlay to make the presentations to the winners in the Grand Prix. The overall winner was Ray Dunne to take the title by 7 points from Eoin Murray with Dermot Kelly a further point behind in third place. Ray was presented with the Behan cup which was due reward for the steady improvement he has made all year. Darren Reilly who is on holidays, was not in attendance to take the Linnane Cup as the fastest athlete of the series, taking maximum points in 5 of the ten races he ran in. There was also a team event this year, see the results below for the winning team. There are a number of prizes still to be collected, contact Paddy or Caroline Tuite to arrange collection.
We look forward to more of the same throughout 2013. if anyone has any ideas as to how they believe the series could be improved, please share them with the Grand Prix Committee.
Results below.
Overall
1. Raymond Dunne 1st
2. Eoin Murray 2nd
3. Dermot Kelly 3rd
4. Pat O’Rourke 4th
5. Sean Doran 5th
6. Ernie Ramsey 6th
6. Emma Dunne 6th
Fastest Athlete – Darren Reilly
Team Competition
Ernie Ramsey
Eoin Murray
Robert Beckett
Ivan Eustace
Pat O’Rourke
Karen Kinsella
Terry Mee
Rachel Wisdom
Margarete McGrath
The Mc Donald cup was on last night too before the presentations, the results are below. The presentation for the handicap in this race will be presented after the Horan Cup on the 10th November.
Ernie Ramsey 0:22:30
Thomas Frayne 0:22:51
Sean Doran 0:23:00
Mark Bermingham 0:23:15
Raymond Dunne 0:23:17
Colm Hickey 0:23:20
Dave Dunwoody 0:23:29
Philip O’Doherty 0:23:36
Dermot Kelly 0:23:55
Ailish McDermott 0:24:15
Ivan Eustace 0:24:25
R O’Reilly 0:24:29
Tara Whyte 0:24:47
Paul Conroy 0:24:48
Maurice McCrohan 0:24:49
Joe Phipps 0:25:11
Liam Hennessy 0:25:56
Colm McDonnell 0:26:58
Bernie Byrne 0:27:06
Pat Devitt 0:27:13
Pat Healy 0:27:31
Pat O’Rourke 0:28:14
Emma Dunne 0:28:23
Sinead Duffy 0:29:04
D Somme 0:29:33
Martin Cavanagh 0:29:39
J McCormack 0:29:50
Feargal Murray 0:32:00 15 laps DQ’d
Padraig Murray 0:32:19