The club's 6th (or 7th?) Burger Run took place in near perfect

running conditions last Friday evening around the old Fields 10KM

course with slight modifications. Dull, slightly chilly, misty!

It's the now traditional Name-Your-Own-Time format and is a

non-championship race but has the designation of being the club's

10KM. Confused? These things are important to some...to me!

Twenty nine toed the line, with 28 from the club and one guest,

Diarmuid Quill (Craughwell AC). Self-estimated times ranged from

40 minutes to over 65 but everyone started the race with the same

very realistic hopes of winning, such are the vagaries / fairness

of the event.

The pre-race bookies' favourite was marked absent, however,

Brendan Monaghan (Tuam AC), so betting on the event was wide

open. There were many dark horses whom the regular punters knew

nothing about too. A lot of people were intentionally putting

down sub-optimal times, while others were more intent on finding

out what their competitors were estimating before announcing

their own times!

James Corbett got proceedings off pretty much on time at 8PM. As

we ambled past the GAA grounds, Frank Burke & Maeve Noone and

helpers were already cooking up a storm. Yummy...

The race itself was uneventful, once we took the rail line and

town out of the course, primarily due to a near miss with a train

almost halting the leaders two years ago - the only day we are

guaranteed no trains of any sort is on 26th December! Iain Shaw

was there making sure that no one made the mistake of crossing

the level crossing while taking a few photos - see below.

There was even a single spectator to encourage us along the way

this year, outside Mount Amber near the VEC building, just as we

came back out onto the Tuam Road. Thanks, JL!

I was tucked in behind both Sinead Brody and Derek Conerney for

most of the race, at least 9KM. I knew I was probably going too

fast and regretted putting down such a soft handicap of 47:30.

The roads were quite slippy and it made hard running that little

bit more difficult than usual, not that this is much of an

excuse. It isn't!

I did try to ease down over the last two KM but the damage was

already done. I almost came to a standstill over the last 500M

as I left both my roadies off into the distance and did stop in

front of the line. Mick Rice had to push me over the finish,

literally, before my time was eventually recorded. 46:19. I

probably had a low 44s in me if I'd really gone about things

properly - previous 10KM was in Annaghdown last month in 43:47.

Way off my handicap and I knew I had no chance, looking at the

competition I faced. Obviously, I didn't know my time until the

results were announced but knew I'd overcooked things.

Cue opportunity to stuff my face with multiple burgers and cans

of Coke - the food of muckers. The rain was holding off but it

had gotten very cold, unseasonably so, for mid-July.

The results were produced within 15 minutes by Adrian Fitzmaurice

and Shirley Quinn with Mary Kate Dilger winning the female prize

by getting within THREE seconds of her estimated time while Enda

Munnelly got to within FOUR ticks of his predicted time to win

the male prize, a slow 50 minutes :-)! Great running with no

watches or other mechanical help to aid in pacing.

Diarmuid Quill won best guest male for the third time in five

years - good enough for 3rd overall. No wonder we can't get rid

of him! He ran a *slow* 41:53. His second race prize in three

days too. There was no guest woman - the best chance a whole

generation of women will ever have of winning anything in Athenry

:-(.

All done and dusted by 9:30PM.

A sincere thanks to James Corbett on the event and to all his

helpers on the night.

Iain's photos are here:

http://www.athenryac.com/image-galleries/club-10k-championships-2011

Full results are attached in my by now usual files formats!