Scrabo Striders Ladies took part in the annual Runher Costal Challenge sponsored by the Belfast Telepgraph last Friday Night. In what is Northern Ireland’s premier women only running event three distances are available. The 5km race starts at Rockport School, the 10km race at Seapark in Holywood and the half marathon (13.1 miles) starts at the Dirty Duck Pub, all finishing in Crawfordsburn Country Park.

In the 5K race Patricia Adams was the club’s first finisher in 27 minutes 4 seconds followed by Fiona McAvoy in 29:27 and Kim Cochrane in 38:06. With kind weather conditions Tina Boal recorded a new personal best time of 43:40 for the 10K distance followed in for Scrabo by Victoria Atkinson in 51:03, Rebecca Lund in 1 hour 7 minutes and Linzi Stewart and Elaine McGonigal a second apart in 1 hour nine minutes.

The half marathon route changed from the previous year to incorporate a hill at the end, very kind of the course designer. Despite this Eileen Pollock secured a new course personal best over the 13.1 miles of 2 hours 12 minutes, followed by club-mates Wendy Thompson in 2:18 and Janeen Murphy in 2:36. Well done ladies.

Midweek saw the annual Bann 10K take place in warm weather, conditions not always favoured by runners. Norman Mawhinney put in an excellent performance finishing 14^th overall in a time of 40 minutes 42 seconds. Fellow Striders Andrew Strickland and Mark Arnold finished seconds apart in 49:36 and 49:48 respectively. The race was hosted by Banbridge Athletic Club.

As part of the Pure Running series, the Newry Half Marathon took place on Sunday on what has been described as one of the fastest and flattest courses in the country. First across the line for Scrabo Striders was Justin Clegg in an impressive 1 hour 38 minutes followed by Graeme McGowan in 1:40, Abrar Hossain 1:41, Peter McGonigal 1:45 and David Turton in 1:48.

The Club’s first lady finisher was Barbara McKechnie in 1:50 followed by Fiona McAvoy achieving a new personal best of 1:56, Liz Turton in two hours, Liam Rodger in 2:08 and Gavin McDonnell in 2:14. Great club representation at this popular race.

In other running new Norman Mawhinney travelled to Edinburgh to complete the 2019 Marathon in an impressive time of 3 hours 21 minutes exactly, bringing his competitive running total distance to 100 miles in 8 days! Meanwhile James Lappin took 18^th place in the 6^th race in the Hill and Dale Series, covering a distance of 4.5 miles and a climb of 1500 feet in just 43 minutes 16 seconds. Performance running demonstrated.

Plenty of personal best times were secured by club members at the weekly 5km Parkruns. At Victoria Park in Belfast Catheine Cauley clocked 20 minutes 20 seconds while over at Stormont Justin Clegg recorded a time of 21:11. At Parkway, Comber Stuart Blair recorded 23:32, Paul Blair 23:50, Amanda Martin 25:32 and Ally Gray 26:26 while Curtis McCaw took overall 1^st place in a fantastic 18:14. Training paying off right there.

by George McGonigal, Vice-Chair