It was a day in which nothing could go wrong for D.S.D., as we recorded an incredible 9 individual wins and 8 team wins at the Dublin Senior and Junior Cross Country Championships in Santry.  Highlights of the day were the 1st and 2nd placings in the Senior men's and Women's races, with Joe Sweeney winning from Brendan O'Neill and Hazel Murphy taking the title from Bryony Treston.

The Senior men's race saw Joe put up a very fine performance, setting off at a fine pace along with Brendan, Alan McCormack, John Coghlan (Metro) and Alan O'Brien (Crusaders).  After two laps Joe and Brendan broke away and led the team to victory, with Alan finishing in 5th place in only his second cross country race for 18 months.  Evergreen vet Peter Mathews finished 10th, Robert Corbally and John Eves completed the team.  Hazel Murphy, who won the British Indoor 3,000m last year and set a club record at 1500m (4.10) duly won by leading all the way for a comprehensive victory.  Surprise packet in 2nd place was Bryony who beat several runners she had never beaten before for a great 2nd place.   A fine team performance saw us eclipse Sports World, who had won the Gerry Farnan race two weeks earlier and were hot favourites for the team title.  Fiona Clinton 12th, Sarah Mulligan 14th and Maria Walsh 15th ensured gold medals for D.S.D.  Emmet Jennings returning from representing us in the Junior World Championships in Canada won the Junior Men's Race by 17 secs., and led the team to silver medals with Gary Weldon 8th; Stephen Gibney 10th and Daniel Tatlow Devally 12th.  Fiona McKenna followed up her Dublin Novice victory by winning the U.20 Championship from Sinead Denny (5 secs. behind);  Meghan Ryan 5th and Niamh Denny 6th (returning from injury).

Our juvenile teams continue to thrive and all qualified for Nationals at the end of the month in Derry, where we hope to continue on our winning ways.  Donal Hennigan, Declan Ryan and Rosanna Baker did a great job in supervising our training programmes as all all our athletes produced their best on the day.  Individual gold medallists were Killian Mooney U.16; Siofra Cleirigh Buttner U.16; Luke McCann U.14; Laoighse Gleeson U.12; Conor Halpin U.12.  Individual silver medallists were Aisling King U.12; Eimear Fitzpatrick U.14; Julian Martin U.16; Claire McCarthy U.16.  Individual Bronze went to Ruby Barlowe U.12 and Patrick Elliott U.14. 

Well done to all!

Eddie