Scrabo Turns Comber Purple!
The Comber 10K road race, organised by the Ballydrain Harrier and Athletic Club, took place on Friday 21st June in warm conditions. This increasingly popular local race is a flat and fast course over two laps starting on Mill Street with what can only be described as a sea of runners and finishing in The Square. There was lots of support all along the route which contributed to a great atmosphere and a great evenings’ running.
Newtownards based running club Scrabo Striders had 118 entrants, the single biggest club representation at the race, so purple vests were everywhere! The first Scrabo Strider to finish was Curtis McCaw in the blistering time of 37 minutes 2 seconds followed by Thomas Steele in 39:35 and Tim McEwan in 41:35. The first Scrabo lady finisher was Tina Boal in 44:30, the Lesley Semple in 46:20 and Cheryl Mulholland in 47:19. Two Striders completed their first ever 10 kilometre distance on the night, namely Alison James and Amanda Stewart. Congratulations!
On Wednesday night thousands of people took part in the annual Lisburn Coca-Cola Half Marathon, 10K Road Race and Fun Run . Now in its 37th year, the sporting event facilitated by Lisburn & Castlereagh City Council , is one of Northern Ireland’s largest individual sporting events with people of all ages and abilities taking part.
In the 10K Peter McGonigal was first in for Scrabo in 47 minutes exactly, position 213 in a field of 1535 finishers, followed by Lynn Sheldon in 50:44, Stephen Ballagh in 52:39, Carol Bailie in 53:40 and George Cash in 55:14. Next came Jonathan Keenan in 56:29, Robin Adams 56:38 and Sonya Summersgill with a new personal best of 56:46. Also finishing the distance were Angie Crone, Kathy Henderson, Esther Bell, Joanne Wray, Scot Knight and Donna Dugan. Well done all.
Under dark thunder-threatening skies the half marathon set off just before 7pm. Ricky Jordan was the first Scrabo Strider to finish in 1 hour 24 minutes, a very impressive time and 28th position in a field of 1022 runners. Next across for the club was Thomas Steele in 1:31 followed by Norman Mawhinney and Graeme McGowan in 1:37, David Turton in 1:47, Lesley Semple and Paul Morrow together in 1:52 and Liz Turton in 1:55.
Just shy by seconds of a sub two-hour half marathon and recording new personal best times, next came George McGonigal, Sheena Crone and Dawn Ross, followed by Gareth Robson, Lyndsey Blair and Gavin McDonnell.
The ENERGIA 24 Hour Race took place on Saturday 22nd and Sunday 23rd June at Victoria Park, east Belfast where four relay teams from Scrabo clocked 136, 134, 127 and 122 miles over the 24 hour period, where each individual ran for two hours periods in rotation.
In the individual competition the goal is quite simply to clock up as many miles as possible within the prescribed 24-hour period. The hardiest of Scrabo Striders went for it, with Norman Mawhinney reaching 108 miles followed by Garry Cavill on 95.5 miles. As a result Norman and Garry took 1st and 2nd place, gold and silver, in the Irish M60 Championship respectively.
Connor McNamara reached 88.3 miles in his first ever endurance event, Ricky Jordan 83.2 miles, Peter Hamlin 77.1 miles, Andrea Cairns 73.5 miles, Ian Frazer 52.5 miles and Kieran McNamara 44.1 miles. Huge congratulations to you all.
The final race in the Hill and Dale mountain running series took place at Drinahilly. James Lappin represented Scrabo taking 20th place in a filed of 194 runners, with a solid time of 26:45. This placed James 30th in the whole series for 2019, setting the bar high for next year.
In other running news congratulations to Lesley Semple who has completed her 200th Parkrun. That’s a total of 1000 km clocked up at the weekly Saturday morning runs.
by George McGonigal, Vice-Chair