3ROC at NI Championships

3ROC took several prizes at today’s Northern Ireland Championships at Binevenagh,  Co. Derry. Colm Moran overtook Ger Butler to win the M21 Long course; Mary O’Connell took W45; Clodagh Moran, running up a class, won W14; Michael Butler took M70 and Trina Cleary won the W65 class.

A bad ankle sprain midway round left M18 Eoin McCullough limping back to the finish, putting his participation in next weekend’s Junior Home International in England in doubt.

The area had a lot of variety, from low-visibility forest to fast old farmland, huge Benbulben-style crags and intricately contoured runnable forest towards the finish. Charlie Reid’s courses made full use of the area and the map, extended by Marcus Pinker, was as clear and accurate as you could want.

Running conditions were perfect: mild and dry (at least for the later starters!) and NWOC laid on an excellent event for NIOC 2012.

A number of visitors from the UK also ran, possibly lured by the Irish Trail Orienteering Championships just up the road, planned by Trail-O supremo Alan Gartside. Unfortunately we had to dash off so we missed that particular experience.

The action-packed weekend also includes a night event on Saturday night and a sprint race at the university in Coleraine on Sunday morning.

Results etc will be on the NIOC website here.