Eight athletes from Dublin University Harriers and Athletics Club (DUHAC) completed the Dublin Marathon on Sunday morning. Of the athletes representing the club, Rory Burke finished with the fastest time, crossing the finish line after three hours.
Justine Quesnel, Matthew McCullagh, Diarmuid Kelly, Paul Butler, Vianney Coppé, Joseph Fitzpatrick and Eavan McLoughlin also finished the race.
In an email statement to The University Times, ladies captain Sorcha McAllister, who stewarded on the course throughout the day, congratulated her teammates on finishing the 42-kilometre race. “The great performances we’ve seen today are a testament to the hard work athletes have put in over the months leading up to the race”, McAllister said.
In an email statement to The University Times, John Moroney, the men’s harriers captain, echoed McAllister’s comments, calling the marathon “one of the ultimate tests of a distance runner” and praising the “incredible times” of DUHAC members.
This was the 38th Dublin Marathon since its foundation in 1980, when just 2,100 runners competed in the race. This year, the marathon was the fifth biggest in Europe, with a record 20,000 entrants competing. The course brought the runners from the city centre to Phoenix Park, before turning them back to the finish line at Merrion Square. This year saw medals decorated with the face of Constance Markievicz in a celebration of female runners.
Asefa Bekele won the men’s race with a time of two hours and 13 minutes, improving on two third-place finishes in previous years. The women’s race was won by Meresa Dubiso, who finished with a time of two hours and 33 minutes.
The past few weeks have been successful ones for Trinity’s athletics club. Last month, former track captain Jemil Saidi was elected Vice-Chair of Dublin University Central Athletic Club (DUCAC) at the body’s 99th AGM. The bioengineering and management student beat incumbent Róisín Harbison in the second round of voting, by 104 votes to 90, with Ian Beatty-Orr of Dublin University Kayaking Club (DUKC) also running for the position.
Addressing the AGM before the vote, Saidi said he would seek to bring smaller clubs up to the same level as the bigger clubs in College, after seeing how much Trinity’s Raising Our Game initiative had benefited the College’s larger clubs.
The AGM was mired in controversy as a number of constitutional rules were breached. As has been the case for a number of years, membership of DUCAC was not checked before the voting slips were handed out, with a number of journalists with The University Times offered slips.
