Mark Walsh and Catherine Murphy claim the honours in Dunmanway 10km

VICTORIES at the Dunmanway 10km road race, which took place in warm conditions, went to Mark Walsh of Leevale and Catherine Murphy from the Eagle club.

Although a race over the same course was held for a number of years back in the 2000s, it lapsed around the Covid pandemic. The present event was re-introduced a year ago and again there was a fine turnout with over 260 finishers.

Catherine Murphy had finished third last year behind her Eagle clubmate Aoife Cooke and Hannah Steeds (Leevale), but this time took the honours in fine style.

Although a minute slower on this occasion, she just did enough to win with her time of 40:07 gave her a comfortable margin over Aoife Mahony, also Eagle, who finished in 40:55 with Heather Dunlea of Leevale taking the third spot in 41:31.

“It’s my second year doing it so I kind of knew what to expect,” explained the winner. 

“It was tough route, but a challenge. I’m starting training now for the Berlin Marathon at the end of September so I’ll be gearing up for that,” said the Eagle athlete who ran 2:56:49 for fourth in her F45 category at last year’s Dublin Marathon.

Also targeting Berlin is third-placed Dunlea, a native of Boston who has been working in Cork with Pfizer for the past few years and is coached at Leevale by Donie Walsh.

It was Donie’s son, Mark, who claimed the men’s title as he led from 3km onwards. He finished in 33:03 with Leevale colleague Donal Coakley second in 34:28. This was Coakley’s third race in two weeks since running 2:37:59 at the Cork City Marathon.

Two West Cork runners, Garrett Lordan (Clonakilty RR) and Kevin Wilmot (Bandon), took third and fourth with the latter also first M40.

“I was happy with that, it was a case of getting the job done more than anything,” said Mark Walsh. “It was warm, I ran a lot of it on my own as after 3km I felt strong and kind of moved on from there.

“Conditions were tough all right, but it was brilliantly organised. You couldn’t go wrong on the course and that’s good for a 10km. The hill at the end was very, very challenging but again it made it interesting so it was a good day’s work overall.” 

Results:

Men:

1 M Walsh (Leevale) 33:03; 2 D Coakley (Leevale) 34:28; 3 G Lordan (Clonakilty RR) 35:30; 4 K Wilmot (Bandon, M40) 35:46; 5 J Ryan (West Waterford) 36:14; 6 T Crowley (Carraig na bhFear, M40) 36:35.

Women:

1 C Murphy (Eagle, F45) 40:07; 2 A Mahony (Eagle, F40) 40:55; 3 H Dunlea (Leevale) 41:31; 4 S O’Regan (Bandon, F40) 43:16; 5 S Holland (Eagle, F45) 43:54; 6 D O’Sullivan (Beara, F45) 46:38.