Drogheda's athletes are masters of relay
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ON Sunday last, the All-Ireland Masters Track & Field Championships were held in Tullamore. This event attracted a huge entry and provided local clubs with some great success. Drogheda and District's Jim McEvoy at 73, retained his 400m & 800m titles in his age group, maintaining a clean sheet since he was 40, a remarkable career for the man who seems ageless.
Johnathan McCabe finished a creditable fifth in his 400m race, whilst Gerard O'Connor, after a slow start showed his class to progress through the field to finish second in his 400m.
The ever fit Shane Mulroy ran a brilliant race to finish second in his Grade 6 race.
Only back from injury, Liam Cooney ran a great tactical race to track the leaders all the way and in a thrilling finish was beaten by a fraction of a second into second place in the 1500m race.
The highlight of the meeting was the relay 4x400m race. The Drogheda and District team of Jonathan McCabe, Gerard O'Connor, Danny Skeffington and Liam Cooney took on the best relay teams that Ireland has to offer and went on to dominate the race with Cooney crossing the line with two metres to spare.
Multi eventer Geraldine Finegan was the leading lady for Dunleer AC with four gold medals at 100m, 400m, javelin and 800m and silver in the shot.
In the over-40s section her Dunleer clubmate Malachy Campbell was first at both 100m and 200m, while Fintan Reilly was first in the 400m and 800m. Earl Taylor had one silver and two bronze over-60, while Kieran Kelly had a silver medal in the 5,000m over 35.
Tom McGrane of Dromiskin-based St Peter's AC continued his steady improvement in the shot putt, as he claimed silver with a good throw of 8.97m in the 45 to 49 age group. Two years ago, Tom finished sixth in the shot putt at these championships, while last year he improved to finish in fifth place.
In January, McGrane made a significant breakthrough when he won bronze at the Irish Masters' Indoor Championships, so he was delighted to maintain his upward trajectory on Sunday by finishing in second place.
Star of the Sea athlete, Barry Delaney enjoyed multiple success, winning the M1 hammer & 56lb weight for distances competition while taking a bronze medal in the discus, throwing a season's best in both the hammer and the weight for distance.
Barry at the moment is competing in the Highland Warrior Trophy, a competition featuring Highland Games events with the result based on the aggregate score from the series of three events. With only the Maghera Series left to take place on September 19th,
Barry is in second place after his exploits in the first two series' at Lisburn and and Dungannon and is looking good going into this final round.
