Autumn in Ireland
The crowd-gathering Wednesday evening races are over for another year but the Irish hill running season still has a few fixtures left to talk about.
Last weekend saw the 25th anniversary of the Warriors Run in Strand Hill, Sligo, a 15k ‘multi-terrain’ race with 6 kilometres of off-road in the middle taking runners over the top of Knocknarea where the legendary Queen of Connacht, is reputedly buried.
Josphat Boit, a native of Kenya now running with Clonliffe Harriers in Dublin, took victory and the 1000 euro prize-money ahead of last year’s winner Owan Gahan, Omagh Harriers. Former world champion John Lenihan who won this race ahead of Kenny Stuart in its inaugural year, finished 6th.
Hail the Lord!
The same weekend, the annual Navigational Challenge kicked off again. The three race series started in the Dublin Mountains and orienteer Peter Kernan, Ajax, took victory at The Lord’s Seat with Sonja Furhmann, Clonliffe, winning the women’s event.
Event organiser Joe Lalor has two more and progressively longer races lined up: The Ow (in Glenmalure) and Up Leinster. The latter event was due to take place on the slopes of Mt. Leinster in Wexford but due to logistics has now been changed to a Co. Wicklow location.
Orienteers and hill-runners with a knack or an interest in navigation and a love of rough ground shouldn’t hesitate to participate in this race series. Joe Lalor is inventor and race organisers for many of the best IMRA events such as the Wicklow Way Relay and recently ran the inaugural Dublin Peaks race, a 32km trek up and down the Dublin Mountains.
The Dublin Peaks
Carlingford Mountain Half-Marathon
DEBRA (the Dystrophic Epidermolysis Bullosa Research Association) has had to cancel the planned Carlingford Mountain Half-Marathon due to take place last weekend as sufficient entry numbers couldn’t be raised.
Hopefully, another attempt will be made at this event next year. DEBRA successfully ran the Wicklow Mountain Half-Marathon in March this year and the Carlingford route promised to take many IMRA runners over rarely run terrain.
Coming Up
Besides the two races left in the Navigational Challenge, the Irish cross-country season begins in October. Before then the ‘rough-runners relay’ better known as the Stone-Cross to Lug relay has been moved forward to the 26th of September and teams of three can look forward to tackling 53k of running among Wicklow’s highest peaks.
The weekend before Mountain Marathon fans will, of course, be making the trip to Newcastle in Co. Down where the dark Mournes sweep down to the sea. The Mourne Mountain Marathon celebrates its 30th anniversary this year.
Finally, IMRA have moved their AGM to the 7th of November. The traditional Powerscourt Ridge race, a 16k run to the top of Djouce with a stern climb, has likewise moved to the same day and is the penultimate race of the year.
The date for the traditional Charles Barrington Memorial race up the Great Sugarloaf has yet to be confirmed but will probably be the 27th of December.
So still plenty in store for off-road enthusiasts West of the Irish Sea…
