National Medals for Tallaght
By Cecil Johnston

At the National AAI Juvenile uneven age Cross Country Championships in Sligo on Sunday last, 17 Tallaght athletes competed against the top qualifiers from all regions of the Country.

Although conditions on the day were relatively dry, the recent bad spell of weather made the underfoot conditions heavy in places and coupled with the large fields of competitors (up to150 in some races), and a steep 400m climb, winning medals on the day was always going to be a tough task. Despite the circumstances our athletes were certainly up for the challenge and delivered some fine performances to take home a total of 11 medals.

Aisling Johnston made her presence felt from the start in the U15 1500m contest, leading the field for the first 600m she stayed in contention in the leading group until eventually finishing a good 5th to take Tallaghts first individual medal and leading Dublin to both Inter County and Regional bronze team wins, giving her a total of 3 medals on the day. 
Tallaght provided two more of the 6 Dublin scorers in the team category, with Jade Corcoran and Rebecca Game finishing in 34th and 35th place respectively, receiving both Inter County and Regional bronze team medals.

In the boys U15 2k, Brian Connolly, after a bad start, made up enough ground to claim an Inter County medal as the 6th scorer on the Dublin bronze medal winning team. In the inter club team category the other 4 Tallaght runners, Eoghan Hennessey, Leigh Bolger, Niall Forrester and Stuart Kelly all ran as best they could on the day.

Robert Fitzsimons put up a very gallant performance in the Boys U17 contest, challenging for the lead until the last 600m, but finished strong enough to hang on to the win Tallaghts second individual medal when crossing the line to take the final individual medal in 12th. Robert, like Aisling earlier was the first Dublin athlete home and led the Dublin team to Inter County team silver, giving him a second medal on the day.

His brother Peter conceding a year to most of the other competitors, was rewarded with a team silver medal when he finished a very a very strong 24th in the same race and was the third Dublin athlete to cross the line. Anthony Lieghio was very unlucky not to get a team medal, when crossing the line as the 7th Dublin athlete, with the final member of the Dublin team to count finishing one place ahead of him. Luke Coleman was the 4th Tallaght competitor to complete the race.

Earlier in the day, Jade Johnston competed in the U11 800m contest and despite conceding a year to most of the other competitors she ran well to finish in the top 60 of the 144 finishers, whilst in the U15 1500m event, Roisin O’ Hanlon also conceding a year finished in 53rd where Ciara O’ Leary competed as the 5th Tallaght member in the inter team category.
The final athletes to compete for Tallaght on the Day were David Somerville and Bronagh O’ Hanlon and whilst both conceded a year in age they ran well within themselves in their respective 5k and 3.5k events, although unfortunately not featuring amongst the medallists.

Photos – Courtesy John Denny