Gregan Smashes Record
By Cecil Johnston

At the concluding day of the Leinster Schools Track & Field Championships at Santry on Saturday last, Brian Gregan, representing St Marks Community School, smashed the 25yr old record in the 400m Intermediate contest. The 16 yr old Tallaght A.C. athlete, tipped by many to be a future star, has been regularly notching up major championship wins in the past year and on almost every occasion lowering his p.b’s. Brian ran a blistering 49.6 to shatter the old record which stood at 50.6, when crossing the line more than 20m ahead of his nearest rival, and is likely to show a clean pair of heels to his rivals at the National finals.

His club and school mate Robert Fitzsimons also brought honour to St Marks when winning the senior 2k steeple chase contest, whilst West Leinster champion, Aisling Johnston (Colaiste De h-Ide) was unlucky to miss the cut for the Nationals when finishing 4th behind older accomplished athletes in the Inter girls 1500m contest. However, she will again be eligible to compete for this title next year. Jade Corcoran (St Pauls, Greenhills), West Leinster Junior champ, finished in the same position in her contest, as did Anthony Lieghio (Drimnagh Castle) in the senior 800m.

Elsewhere, Peter O’ Farrell combined with Paul Mahon (IMRA) to win first team prize in the Ordnance Survey sponsored adventure race in Kerry, where they canoed 5k, ran a 10k road race, followed by a grueling 15k run across Carrauntoohill and other mountain peaks, and finished with a 20k bike race, in a total time of 4hrs 20mins. This fantastic achievement earned them first prize of €5,000, which they kindly donated to charity.

In the Dublin County Board Graded meet at Irishtown last Wednesday, Davey Byrne recorded 9.07 in the grade “A” 3k, whilst Ronan Kearns recorded 54.82 in the same grade when finishing 7th in the 400m contest and Keith Sherlock finished 10th in the grade “B” 1500m.in a time of 4.25m.

The results of the Dublin Novice Road Race Championships held in Lucan a few weeks ago have finally been confirmed and our men’s team, Nilton Demorez, Colm Barcoe, Bill Murphy and James Crowley won the team event with Nilton picking up individual silver.

The final meet of the Dublin Juvenile Track & Field league will take place in Santry on Friday evening next and a number of our athletes will be in contention for trophies, after notching up the points in the previous 3 meets.