As the Dublin City Marathon is just 11 days away, a Sunday has been chosen this year by the organising committee instead of the traditional October Bank Holiday Monday, to encourage more people from abroad to take part. Well, it certainly encouraged more local participation as some of our local girls have signed up for their first ever marathon event. At this stage, they have stuck to their training plan and to tackle the fundraising bit they held a hugely successful quiz in Burke’s on Saturday night last followed by a raffle and raised a whopping €1,700 for CF Ireland (Cystic Fibrosis) a very meaningful cause and extremely passionate charity for both Catherine Burke, Colemanstown and Anne Marie Walsh, Gurteen. Running for the cause is no easy feat as we can only imagine the effort, commitment, sacrifices and training that goes into running a marathon. Sponsorship can still be given to the girls anytime before their departure for Dublin. We wish them luck in their first ever marathon as we also wish Carol Screene, Colemanstown and Pat Roberts, Gurteen the very best in their marathon exploits. This is also Pat’s first Dublin marathon while Carol has been a regular attendee in Dublin on the October bank holiday weekend, this being her 7th Dublin marathon to run and her 11th in total, having also featured in Connemara, London and New York coming first in the U19 female category in New York many moons ago; a fine accolade indeed. Other local athletes participating include Mark Mills, Brierfield & Colleen Gallagher while Gearoid Rohan is racing against time to fight an ankle injury sustained in a training session some weeks back and was also scheduled to participate in the Frankfurt marathon the same day as Dublin. Knowing Gearoid he will put in a big fight to get there. Tracy McDonagh, Castleblakney is also scheduled to participate in the New York marathon for Croi in early November. You’d have to respect these folks on their running journey, we all know how respect is hard earned. We wish all runners the very best in their efforts. Pictured are just 2 of our 4 quiz winners who came up trumps out of 17 tables during last Saturday nights fundraiser quiz held in Burke’s, Colemanstown: Carol Screene, Colemanstown & Mary Mellody, Guilka. The other 2 winners, Ruth Dempsey & Leanne O’Donovan had absconded before the paparazzi got a chance to invade their winning space!
