One marathon a year not enough for “runkies”

Dave Brady

For some people one marathon in a life is quite enough; for others marathon running has become their life, as the number of small-scale marathons taking place almost every weekend around the country testifies.

For instance, between August 14 and 17 last week, fifty-one men and women tackled a marathon a day in the scenic surroundings of the Inishowen peninsula in Co Donegal. The marathons took place at four locations – Kinnego Bay, Malin Head, Mamore and Muff. Finishing top of the table after the four days was Steven McGeown, with his best time of 3 hrs 14 mins 38 secs coming at the final run at Muff. His total for the four days was 12 hrs 38 mins 51 secs. That’s an average of around 3 hours 9 mins per marathon.

Second was Jacek Latala with a total of 13 hrs 04 mins 17 secs, while third was the veteran Richard Ginn in 13 hrs 8 mins 34 secs, who finished second on the first two days behind McGeown. First woman was Helena Doran in just under 17 hours. Among the finishers was Raheny’s Dave Brady, who celebrated his 65^th birthday a few weeks ago by running his 500^th marathon. Also completing all four marathon days was Ruby Ooi, now 67, who used to run for Blackrock AC in Co Dublin. In all,  a record 94 completed the four-day challenge.

A week earlier from August 4-8, Dave Brady had ran five marathons in five days, this time in Howth village. The event was the brainchild of Ger Copeland of East of Ireland Marathons – a not-for-profit organisation set up to organise low-key low-cost marathons for “runkies”. These are runners whose target in life is to become – initially at least – members of the 100 Marathon Club. Few stop when they make this target, if Dave Brady is anything to go by.

The more extreme “runkies” were catered for by another challenge: to run ten marathons a day for the five days. In all, six completed this challenge, and appropriately, it was Copeland himself who came out on top of the list. His fastest time of 3 hrs 23 mins 10 seconds was his first run and his slowest a 4 hrs 8 mins 54 secs time for his second marathon on day 4. Finishing second overall was Paul Murphy, while first woman was Lilian Deegan, who suffered on day 3 when her time went over six hours but recovered to complete the challenge. Of the fifteen who restrained themselves to five marathon in five days, Dipak Vala finished top of the table.

Many of these were in action again last Sunday weekend when the Pat the Baker Longford Marathon takes place. This race, initially started to allow local man Liam Fenelon run his 100^th marathon in his home town, has gone from strength to strength.

• This story initially went out in the Herald of  Wednesday August 26. Unfortunately, the results for the quadrathon were from last year. Only yesterday did I find the correct 2015 results (and that wasn’t easy….). Apologies for the error.