Coleraine Cancer 10K

An event primarily organised to raise funds for ‘The Boom Foundation’, but which attracted several well-known athletes..

The race was over two laps of the roads surrounding the university campus. Springwell’s Paul Thompson led the runners through after the first lap with teammate Gemma Turley leading the ladies. When the runners returned to the finish City of Derry’s Mark Mullan had moved to the front of the field breaking the tape in 35:31.

Springwell’s Rhodri Jones ran a storming second lap moving through the field to take second place in 35:44, while Kevin O’Boyle (Ballymena Runners) followed eleven seconds later in 35:55 for third place.

Springwell’s Gemma Turley extended her lead in the second lap to win in 39:45. The fast improving Suzanne Arbuthnot crossed the line in 42:03 second place before Karen McLaughlin completed a Springwell top three crossing the line in 42:16.

Meanwhile, the 2014 British and Irish Junior Mountain Running Home Internationals took place on Saturday in Glendalough, Co. Wicklow on the Camaderry Course which was also used for this event in 2009. The course was on mainly forest tracks with a small bit of open mountain along grassy paths. The course is extremely runnable and fast times were expected.  

Heavy overnight rain made for challenging conditions underfoot especially on the steep rocky descent. The course certainly lived up to expectations with some very fast times and some spectacular falls. Springwell’s Oisin Brennan, a member of the N.I. junior Mountain Running Team was running in the U17 boy’s race.  

The race was won by Tristan Rees of Fife AC and Scotland in 23:56 with Oisin finishing in 11th place in 25:43.  Scotland easily took the team prize.

It was another sunny Saturday morning at Portrush parkrun and the tide was on its way out leaving the sand quite firm underfoot.

A beach start welcomed the 98 runners. There were 15 first timers, 36 PB’s were recorded and three different athletics clubs represented.