Local Success at European Cross Country

Local athletes lived up to the home support, with stellar performances, resulting in Ireland finishing 3^rd in the points table, just behind Team GB and France.

U20 Men

One of the highlight performances of the day was of course, the U20 Men’s Silver, with NI’s Nick Griggs (Mid Ulster AC/ Coach: Mark Kirk) finishing in 16^th place. The team of Abdel Laadjel (6^th); Dean Casey (13^th); Scott Fagan (21^st); Sean Kay (50^th) and Cathal O’Reilly (77^th) produced a superb performance, with the first three athletes all inside the Top 20, finishing only a single point off the gold medal.

Speaking to Brian Hill on the day, 16-year-old, Nick (Mid Ulster AC/ Coach: Mark Kirk) said:

“It just wasn’t my day and I’ve no excuses. I had to dig in deep there and kept fighting to the end. I wasn’t going to give up as the crowd support was fantastic. It was a great learning experience for the future”.

U20 Women

The U20 Women’s team put in a strong performance with 3 athletes securing Top 30 placings, leaving Ireland in 8^th place in the final team standings.

UCD AC and Youth Academy athlete, Aoife McGreevy (Coach: Mark Kirk) was the first over the line for Team Ireland in 23^rd place, with Emma McEvoy in 24^th place, both finishing in 14.07, just 3 seconds outside of the Top 20. Loughview AC’s Rebecca Rossiter (Coach: Andrew Han) and North Belfast Harriers’ Roise Roberts (Coach: Jim McGuinness) were supported up the home straight by the crowd, to both finish under 15 minutes, with Rebecca in 38^th place in 14:22 and Roise in 77^th place in 14:54. Irish team mates, Jane Buckley finished in 30^th place in 14:15 and Laura Mooney finished in 55^th place in 14:36.

Mixed Relay

The Senior Mixed Relay team just missed out on the medals, with World Championship Track Finalist, Ciara Mageean (Team New Balance/ Coach: Steve Vernon) putting on a stirring display in the first leg to give a useful 3 second lead to team mate Luke McCann in the second leg. Ireland’s Siofra Cleirigh Buttner took the 3^rd leg and Andrew Coscoran took the final leg, to finish in 4^th place overall, in 18:06 behind Belgium.

Senior Men

As expected, Norwegian Olympian, Jakob Ingebrigsten toyed with the opposition in the Senior event to win easily by some 14 secs. Ireland’s Brian Fay was 10th with Tonosa Haso 13th. Newcastle & District AC’s Ryan Forsyth (Coach: Richard Rodgers) finished in 58^th place overall in a time of 32:58.

Senior Women
Team Ireland finished in 4^th place overall in the Senior Women’s event, with NI Olympian, Eilish Flanagan (Finn Valley AC/ Coach: Damon Martin) finishing within the Top 20 in 15^th place in a time of 28:39. NI’s 5000m record holder, Roisin Flanagan, finished in 26^th place in 28:54. Their Irish team mates, included Fionnuala McCormack, who finished in 9^th place despite having ran a 2hr 23 min marathon only a week earlier. Aoibhe Richardson finished in 23^rd place in 28:48, while Aoife Cooke finished in 38^th place in 29:15 and Michelle Finn finished in 46^th place in 29:34.

Full results can be found here

Photos