Tipperary intermediate road titles for Louise Fogarty and Emmet McNamara

Galbally was the venue last Sunday for the County Intermediate Road Championships.

WOMEN’S RACE
The women’s 4k saw six clubs challenging for the honours. The race started and right away the warm favourite, Louise Fogarty of Moyne AC made her intentions known as she set a strong pace on the uphill stretch that soon had the field in Indian file. The chasing pack included Laura Earley of Fethard AC and Orla Healy of Moyne AC.

Up front Louise was making every stride a winning one and she came home a very worthy and convincing champion in 14 mins 55 secs, superb running in such difficult conditions.

The battle for the minor placings was settled inside the final mile, with Orla Healy winning the silver medal in 15:08 and Laura Earley of Fethard AC winning the bronze medal in 15:24.

For the record Mary Keane of Dundrum AC was 4th (15.46), Catherine Fogarty of Dundrum AC 5th (16:06), Tish Ryan of Dundrum AC 6th in (16:13) and Angela Fogarty of Moyne AC 7th (16:24).

In the team event, Moyne AC were crowned county champions with their team of Louise, Orla and Angela on 10 points for the second time.

The Dundrum team of Mary Keane, Catherine Fogarty and Tish Ryan won the silver medals; the host team of Deirdre Bailey, Noelle O’Brien and Martina Moloney won bronze.

MEN’S RACE
The men’s 8k race saw the early pace set by the Fethard AC duo of Louis Rice and the eventual champion Emmet McNamara. They were soon well clear of the chasing pack, and they matched one another stride for stride all the way. Then as they came back into the village, Emmet made his move and went clear to win this coveted title impressively in 27 mins 6 secs, with Louis winning the silver in 27 mins 12 secs. Then we had Barry Hartnett of Dundrum emerging from the chasing pack to win the bronze medal in 28 mins 10 secs.

Dundrum AC athletes occupied the next three finishing positions with Philly O’Dwyer 4th in 28:32, Eamonn Morrissey 5th in 28:34 and Tom O’Connell 6th in 28:35. With four athletes in the top seven, Dundrum AC were crowned Inter Club champions with 18 points.

Dundrum were adding this title to the County Novice title won the previous Sunday in Moyne.

The silver medals were won by the Fethard AC team of Emmet, Louis, Fintan Rice 15th (30:27) and Joe Morgan 24th in (31:58). The bronze was won by the Mooreabbey Milers quartet of Sean Landers 8th (29:44), Kevin Patrick Lenihan 14th (30:21), Willie O’Donoghue 16th (30:34) and Robert Cunningham 19th (30:47).

At the presentation of the awards Owen Fanning, the county chairman, thanked Mooreabbey Milers for having everything in place for two very good races. He also thanked the clubs for supporting these championships.

County Senior Road Championships
Templemore is the venue this Sunday for the County Junior and Senior Road Championships for both Women and Men, starting at 10 am with the women’s 5k. Please note the early start.

In the women’s race Dymphna Ryan of Dundrum AC will start as warm favourite following her good performance at the recent Streets of Kilkenny 5k. Dymphna will be going for her fifth successive title. Other athletes vying for a podium placing include the current County Intermediate champion Louise Fogarty and her clubmate Orla Healy along with Kealey Tideswell of Clonmel AC, Linda Grogan of Dundrum AC and Laura Earley of Fethard AC.

The defending club champions are Moyne, and they will be going all out to add this coveted title to the County Intermediate cup they won last Sunday. They will face good competition from Dundrum, Templemore, Fethard, Clonmel, Mooreabbey Milers and Thurles Crokes.

The Men’s race will see a new champion crowned. The current holder is Kevin Moore and he has since transferred to Mullingar Harriers and so won’t be defending this title, which he has won on three occasions. The pre-race favourite following his fine performance in the recent Streets of Kilkenny 5k is Mossy Bracken of Moycarkey Coolcroo AC. Mossy was second last year and will be going all out to win this one. He will face stiff competition from the likes of Emmet McNamara and Louis Rice of Fethard AC, Barry Hartnett and Eamonn Morrissey of Dundrum, to name just a few.

The defending club champions are Dundrum, going for a clean sweep of team titles. They should face good competition from Moycarkey Coolcroo, who were second team last year as well as Fethard, Mooreabbey Milers and Templemore.