Julie is fastest in Newry Half Marathon

The club’s athletes’ performances matched the weather throughout the week - just fantastic!

Newry on Bank Holiday Monday was the venue for the Newry Marathon and Half Marathon races in which Dromore athletes had a big say in the final outcome of each.

Julie Turley, who has been having a great year to date, claimed her sixth win of the racing season with a fantastic performance in the woman’s half marathon race which she dominated from start to finish; her brilliant run brought her home a clear winner in the superb time of 1 hour 20m 37 s (PB).

In the men’s half marathon there were very good runs and personal bests from David Allen (1hr 50m) and Ian Cardwell (1hr 54m 13s).

The marathon race saw Nigel Grier also give a fantastic performance over the 26.2 miles as his outstanding run in the warm conditions brought him home in 2hrs 48m 39s for a superb second place overall and also first over 45 - just rewards for the hard training he put in leading up to the event.

Seamus McKeown got in amongst the prizes with his super run to claim first O60 in the men’s marathon in 3hrs 53m 25s.

The picturesque setting of Craigavon Lakes was next on the list for the Dromore club, this time the distance was 10k.

With the heat seeming to getting to most of the athletes in the race the performances from the local athletes were outstanding with Damian Fearon leading them home in 38m 35s, closely followed by Gillian Burns taking third female overall in 39.17.

Then came Marty McConaghy 43.44, Diane McKee 45.49, Janice Reid 46.56, Caroline Nelson 47.47, Helen McCartan 48.21, Johnny McCaughtry 48.41, Russell Kennedy 49.14, Wendy Fleming 49.15 and Ian Bates 50.20.

In between these road races young Rebekah Nixon was having a mini Olympics of her own as firstly she was off to Magherafelt for the Ulster Children’s Games where her outstanding performances won her two championship medals.

She won gold in the shot put with a PB throw of 6.78m and bronze in a very close finish of the 600m, again in another PB of 1m 53s.

Next for Rebekah was on to Shaws Bridge for the Pioneer Lagan Valley trail race where she took part in the junior girls 2.2K race and put on a super performance to win the race.

On a sun drenched track in Tullamore, Co Offaly was where the Irish schools track and field finals were held and again club athletes were competing for their schools and did them proud with their superb efforts.

Ulster schools champion Ryan McDermott (SERC) had a fantastic run in the senior boys 5000m race to finish second and claim the silver medal in a very competitive race throughout and the added bonus of a big personal best of 15m 22.22s.

Victoria Kincaid (Our Ladies) also got among the medals in the U16 girls invitational one mile race where her super run and another PB saw her finish third in 5m 33s.