Round up: James Nolan returns and more…(updated Aug 15th)

A few road races to catch up on over the course of the weekend. Fittingly seen as the week that was in it the big news is the return of two time Olympian James Nolan to action. At the Midlands 5k in Portlaoise today August 12th, James returned with a win in his first race in over four years! His time? A very impressive 16.11. Clearly those behind closed doors sessions have paid off! Great timing as well as club captain Joe Cooper weighs up his options for next weekend`s National league final.

Another Clonliffe man on the come back from Injury, although not after such a lenghty lay off was Sergiu Ciobanu. In yesterday`s (Saturday) GR8KM road race in Mitchelstown, County Cork Sergiu had his first race in several months with a fine win in 25:06. This was a very good performance by Sergiu as he had a winning margin of the best part of two and a half minutes and yet he never let up running a new course record as he bettered the previous mark by over half a minute.

The Focus Ireland Dublin Tunnel Run took place this morning with a huge Clonliffe support team involved in assisting with the running of the event which attracted an entry of some 2,000. Top Clonliffe man on the day was Ernie Ramsey who ran a strong race throughout claiming 3rd spot in 34:33!  Aisling Coppinger was 3rd woman in 41:48.  Also well up was Kieran Murphy, 17th in 38:11.

Finally, news just in, Seanna Reilly had a very good run in her first international at the weekend`s Celtic Games in Aberdeen, Scotland. Seanna ran the first leg of the U/18 4 x 400 relay, running 57.34, as the Irish girls won setting a new Celtic games record. More good news as the Irish took the overall team title.