Ulster champs Pt.1

We travelled to the U.U.J. on Sat for the even age group xc champs.  With gale force winds and driving rain it was always going to hard for our athletes to make an impression. We train our athletes very lightly and with long term goals, principally for the track. This leaves them at a disadvantage in hard conditions on tough xc courses but should, we hope, pay dividend's over the passage of time. Despite this we had hopes of qualifying  a couple for the Irish champs, this needing a top twelve finish. Tiernan Forde, Lorcan Forde, Aishling McAnulty and Katie O'Hare all finished strongly in huge fields in their categories coming home in 63rd,  21st,  90th & 29th places. These races are the highest standard races in Ulster every year and the pace is always blinding fast and relentless and our less experienced athletes will learn from their day out. It's hard to believe that 11 year old Charlotte Rea is now our most experienced athlete and was competing in her third Ulster's and was chasing a place in the Irish champs for the second time. Charlotte has recently started to develop a more competitive streak and went to the line determined to give herself a chance of qualification. 700 mts into a tough 1km race Charlotte was on course and on the finishing loop she controlled her race and came home in an excellent 11th place. This was a tremendous performance full of maturity and aggression. Every time Charlotte competes she learns more about herself and applies these lessons well. A tremendous athlete doing a great job. Last one up was Aislinn Crossey and as usual Ais delivered a sparkling performance to both put herself in a position to qualify and to finish the job off. Ais stormed home in 4th place and left this coach with no doubt that without the wind and muddy conditions a gold medal was a distinct possiblity! All our young athletes deserve immense credit for their hard work as do the parents who give up their time to come and support them. We move on to Donegal for the un-even Ulster's in a fortnights time.