North Down AC athletes were delighted with last week’s return to Stormont. The restoration of the Assembly and the appointment of club member Andrew Muir as the Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Minister paled into second place behind one of the members’ favourite annual cross country races in the grounds of the Stormont estate on Saturday 10th February.
In the U13 races over 2000m Sophie Rankin was 1st, Lara Cheatley was 2nd and Caitlyn Dickenson came 4th.
The under 13 boys had excellent races too with Carter Rolston finishing 2nd, Sebastian Mair 3rd and Isaac Hall 11th and in the 3000m under 15 boys’ race Alex Downey was 2nd.
[Isaac, Seb, Carter, Caitlyn, Lara, Sophie]
In the 3.3 mile women’s race Sarah Grant 20:35 was the first NDAC lady home in 6th place overall. Fiona McQuillan 21:40 was 13th and Clair Quigley 22:17 was 18th. Superb performances also followed from Roberta Dornan 23:16, Sarah Gibson 23:32, Fiona McVicar 24:31, Sarah Connolly 24:31, Lindsay Doulton 24:34, Caroline Coghlin 25:42, Claire Scott 25:43, Zarah Fulton 25:54, Jill Aiken 26:15, Marion Beattie 26:48, Emma Fox 27:01, June McMinn 1st F65 in 27:05, Agata Young 28:24, Hannah Dunne 30:23, Emma Hegarty 31:32, XC debutante Sophie Hamilton 32:24 and Cara Jeffrey 36:36.
[Clair Quigley, Fiona McQuillan, Sarah Connolly, Sarah Grant]
[Luke Hamilton, Cara Jeffrey, Sophie Hamilton]
The senior men swept up age category prizes with Terry Eakin 24:01 taking 1st M70 honours and John Adgey 31:28 and pat O’Driscoll 35:21 finishing 1st and 2nd in the M75 age group.
In the senior men’s 4.4 mile race Craig McMeechan 22:44 showed no fatigue from the Armagh road races to win convincingly , putting 59 seconds between himself and 2nd place. Chris Moran 25:36 was 14th and Jamie McMeechan 25:40 was 15th. It was good to see James Budde returning to form in 26:24, David McKeague 26:42, Thomas Steele 27:20, Declan Magee 27:24, Sean McLaughlin 27:48, Aaron McAuley 28:07, Alan McConnell 28:23, David Massey 29:28, Tom Agnew 30:18, Tim Cooke 31:37, Colin Walker 31:55, Luke Hamilton 32:28, Robert Martin 34:26 and David Balmer 38:08 made up the rest of the excellent performances from the senior mens’ squad.
[Craig McMechan]