New York, the city of dreams!!

What a weekend for our striders! Jill Long and Andrea Cairns only went and took on the TCS New York City Marathon!!

The NYC Marathon course runs 26.2 miles through the five boroughs of NYC, starting at the Verrazano–Narrows Bridge on Staten Island, passing through Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, and the Bronx before finishing at the infamous Central Park!  Coming in first for the Striders was Andrea Cairns with an unbelievable time of 4:52:28!! Following her then was Jill with a time of 5:18:00. Jill has added this marathon to her bow having just completed both Berlin and London!

Brilliant work ladies, enjoy the celebrations!!

Back in Northern Ireland, Saturday saw the Striders take on Born to Run at Minnowburn. Minnowburn was kicking off the Born to Run Forest Run Series which will be held in 6 beautiful forests including Minnowburn, Loughgall Country Park, Tollymore Forest Park, Gosford Forest Park, Antrim Castle Gardens and Castlewellan Forest Park. All runners enjoy the series, and it is no surprise that it has won best race series in the UK & Ireland at the 2019 and 2020 Running Awards in London.

Both 5km and 10km races started and finished at the popular state-of-the art Mary Peters Track, which is the home of Northern Ireland Athletics. The route covered a variety of terrain types including track, forest trails, country roads and then led you through the National Trust property at Minnowburn and back along the banks of the River Lagan.

In the 10k race Graeme Farrington was first in with a time of 00:55:09 followed by Davy Gordon 01:04:08 and Nicky Alexander-Locke 01:13:45.

Taking on the 5K was Willow Farrington with an amazing time of 24:51, followed by Debbie Osborne 34:11 , then Clare McCormick 45:14,  Steven McCormick 45:14 and  Tina Hewitt  50:21.

Saturday also meant Park Run!! We had two fabulous ladies who were both celebrating 50 glorious Park Runs!! Karen Farrelly ran hers at Comber and got a PB of 26:24, and over at Ward Park, we also had Kerrie Fox who bagged herself a PB at 28:47!!  What an accomplishment!

The club in total had 65 runners out running at 15 different Park Run locations!! Bangor Park Run was the most popular with 13 club runners and we had 23 runners trying out new venues for the first time! Trying out those new venues were Andy Haylett, Thomas Steele, Lyn McGonigal and Sharon Gamble at Waterworks Parkrun Belfast, Faye, Cheryl and Eva Alexander at Victoria Park, Karl, Amelia and Kathy  Henderson at Hillsborough, Allie Farley and Liam Rodger at Dungannon,  Jonathan Keenan at Dunleath, Catherine Cauley and Jenna Lavery at Comber,  George Johnston at Crawfordsburn, Matt Bell at Orangefield and Jonathan Bull at Stonehaven!

Congratulations to Martin Strachan who also got a PB at Victoria Park 17:30, Jonathan Winter with course PB at Ward Park 21:12, Gavin McDonnell with a course PB at Orangefield 28:22, Nicola Forsythe 31:05 , Kim Cochrane 32:39 and Mairead Curran 41:55 with Course PBs at Stormont, and Michael Johnston at Comber with a time of 20:09.

A ‘little’ further away we had Neil Mearns, Michael Burgess and Cheryl McCartney travel to Gorey Parkrun in County Wexford , where Michael got a PB of 21:31 and Cheryl McCartney got a PB of 36:32. Neil also finished 2nd place with a time of 20:04.

And over in ‘Bonny’ Scotland we had Luke Mars and Hannah Magee take on the Portabello Park Run in Edinburgh. Luke came in with at time of 33:06 and Hannah 33:39!

Special credit must also be given to our four-legged friends! We had Dante and Otto who were at Dungannon with Allie and Liam, Milo who was with Gillian and our Dave in his striders tee with Sheena at Ward Park!  #Barkrun

Sunday then saw the Ballynahinch WMRC Run to Remember 5K 2022. This Run was organised by the Ballynahinch branch of the Royal British Legion and raises money for the much-deserved poppy appeal. Did you know that the first ever Poppy Appeal was in 1921? All the Poppies sold out and an amazing £106,000 was made!

Sundays run was also especially memorable with the medal commemorating her majesty, Queen Elizabeth II.

Coming in first out of the runners was our Norman Mawhinney with a time of 0:20:18, followed by Graeme McGowan 0:23:06. Matthew Halus was next in with the time 0:23:13 followed by Paul Sheldon 0:25:08, Ian Bailie 0:25:55 Chris Millar 0:25:55 George McGonigal 0:26:43

Lynn Sheldon 0:27:23 ,Carol Bailie 0:29:24, Mark Gilmore 0:31:15, Bobby McGonigal  0:32:38, Sonya Summersgill 0:36:04 and Judith Boyd 0:36:04. Well done to all runners!

Sunday also meant junior parkrun!! The Club had 16 runners at two venues! Comber was our most popular running spot.

Ethan Lappin was 1st with a time of 08:15,  Isabella Haylett with 10:08 and Willow Farrington at 08:45. Adam Haylett had a PB at 09:19!!

Well done to Maisie McNamara on her first time at Victoria Park and to Luke Braniff who finished in 3rd place with a time of 08:21. Brilliant running everyone!!

Scrabo Striders are an all-inclusive running club for all abilities offering training Monday - Thursday with a social run on both Friday night and Sunday mornings, and trail running Sunday night. Why not come and give it a try?