Name: Martin Daly

Member of Eagle AC since: 2016

How long have you been running what made you take it up: I’m running since 2013, I managed to give up smoking and took up running to try to keep off them. Became addicted to running instead!

Favourite thing about running: The freedom it gives you to get out and clear your head and the opportunity to meet others in the running community.

Favourite race distance to run: I think maybe the 5 mile distance, The Ballycotton summer series were some of my first races.

What is your main goal for this year: If Charleville Half Marathon goes ahead a PB hopefully!

Your best race/most memorable racing moment to date: I really enjoyed Berlin Marathon last year and the finish near the Brandenburg gate.

Tell us something most people might not know about you: I’m actually not from Bandon!

Biggest heroes (sporting or non-sporting): John Tracey, love watching Jimmy McGee’s classic commentary in the Los Angeles ’84 Olympic Marathon. Always makes me want to sign up for one.

One bit of advice you would give to someone thinking of taking up running: Slow down.

3 things you would take with you onto a desert island: 3 pairs of Vaporflys.

(Photo from Running in Cork blog)

Race 2 of the Eagle AC Summer Series ( Virtual Edition) was another great success with exactly 80 members logging their 5 mile runs from Wednesday 17th to Friday 19th June.

With the 5k limit now removed this race gave a chance for some training partners to re-unite and run together which was great to see!

Like Race 1 there was a variety of different reasons for running this time round – some used it to race, some to catch up with friends and family, and some to check progress with recovery from injuries. Photos from this months run can be found here –https://www.flickr.com/photos/125872653@N04/sets/72157714794992261/

Choosing to race certainly paid off for Sandra Manning, Karen Bevan, Martin Daly and Glenn Kenneally who we heard all claimed new 5 Mile PBs this time around! Tim McCarthy had a great run also, taking over 2 minutes of his Race 1 time. Looks like Tim is well on the road to recovery from recent injuries which is great to see! It’s brilliant to see Geraldine Corcoran back in the Eagle singlet also and we wish her continued success with her comeback. Special mention this time around to Tom Fox also who manged to run Race no. 2 in the exact same time as Race no. 1 – we’ll have to reserve a special spot prize for you Tom if you manage to run the same time for races 3 and 4 also! Frank Cotter used this race to perfect his selfie game also as well as recording a great 5 mile run!

The club will be donating at least €1 for each run logged throughout the series to Fota Wildlife Park. The Covid-19 crisis of course meant that the park had to close its gates for a prolonged period of time. A large portion of it’s income comes from daily visitors and this of course, has been hugely impacted over the last few months. The cost of feeding the 135 species of animals in the park alone is approximately  €30,000 a month. The money raised from our Summer Series will go directly towards the feeding bill and operational costs of the park. As well as the donation from the club, a GoFundMe page has been set up, where members can pay a voluntary race entry fee for each of the remaining races in the series. The suggested fee is  €5 but any amount, big or small would be greatly appreciated. A big thank you to all members who have donated so far. Between both members and club donations we have currently raised almost €600 for Fota. The GoFundMe page can be found here for those who wish to donate – https://gf.me/u/x86vm7

With all that said, prize draw for Race no. 2 was made on Sunday morning and this months winners are :

Trevor O’Donovan – €20 voucher – The Edge Sports

Dan Kelleher – €20 voucher – The Edge Sports

Pat O’Connor – €15 voucher – The Edge Sports

Jacqueline Slyne – €10 voucher – The Edge Sports

There was an extra draw this time round for all those members who donated to Fota Wildlife Park through our Go Fund Me page. The winner of this draw was Joe Murphy. Well done to Joe who has won a family day pass for Fota Wildlife Park.

Well done to our winners! Dan, you should buy a lotto ticket – you seem to be on a bit of a lucky streak these days! Don’t worry to those who lost out – lots more prizes to be won over the remaining races in the series!
A massive thanks to both The Edge Sports Shop and Fota Wildlife Park for their very generous sponsorship of prizes. It is really very much appreciated.

The 3rd race in the series will run from July 15th -17th and we hope that it will prove just as popular and successful as the first 2 races. Thanks to all for their continued support of the series.

Thanks to all those who sent in book recommendations over the past couple of weeks. We should have enough here to keep us going over the summer months! Below is a list of the most popular books suggested. The ones recommended numerous times are marked with stars. By far the most highly recommended were both of the Adharanand Finn books.

 Hopefully there’s something in here that will suit everyone. Happy reading!

Thanks to Frank for reminding us that Cork City Libraries have a free online lending service available also. See their website for more information.

• *Let your Mind Run – Deena Kastor – brilliant read from this Olympian Marathon Runner
• *How Bad Do You Want It? Mastering the Psychology of Mind Over Muscle – Matt Fitzgerald
• *Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen – Christopher McDougall – New York Times Best Seller
• Running for Better -A Story about Running to Live and Think Better
• Running to the Edge – Matthew Futterman
• Running for the B-team – Mike Bannister ( One man’s obsessive quest to run a marathon in under 3 hours)
• *The Way of the Runner   – a journey into the fabled world of Japanese running
• *The Sports Gene- David Epstein Epstein (Not really a running book but a few good nuggets of information in there for runners!)
• Eat & Run – Scott Jurek
• North – Scott Jurek
• Running With Joy – Ryan Hall
• *The Way of the Runner – Adharanand Finn
• *Running with the Kenyans – Adharanand Finn -Sunday Times Sports Book of the Year
• The Rise of the Ultrarunners – Adharanand Finn
• 2 Hours – Ed Caeser
• Don’t Stop Me Now – Vassos Alexander
• The Ghost Runner – Bill Jones
• The Perfect Mile – Neal Bascomb
• Marathon Man – Bill Rodgers
• Today We Die A Little – Richard Askwith
• Who, Dares Runs – 32 marathons in 32 Days – Gerry Duffy
• Tick Tock Ten – Gerry Duffy ( His account of running 10 Ironmans in 10 days)
• A Life Without Limits – Chrissie Wellington
• To the Finish Line – Chrissie Wellington ( Both of these are mainly Ironman themed but plenty about running in there too – Chrissie is hugely involved with the Parlrun movement in the UK
• You Pace or Mine – Lisa Jackson ( A good one for back of the pack runners according to the person who recommended this!)
• Running Like A Girl – Alexandra Heminsley ( Very relatable!!)
• Finding Ultra – Rick Roll
• *From Last to First by Charlie Spedding (Spedding finished in third place behind John Treacy in the 1984 Olympic Marathon)
• The Lore of Running – Tim Noakes ( Very comprehensive on all matters related to running – 900 odd pages)
• What I Talk About When I Talk About Running – Murakami
• Daniels’ Running Formula – Jack Daniels
• Advanced Marathoning  – Pete Pfitzinger
• Endure – Alex Hutchinson
• Peak Performance by B Stulberg and Steve Magness
• Dean Karnazes – The Ultra Marathon Man
• Mark Rowlands – The Philosopher and the Wolf

Name: Tamara Lopez

Member of Eagle AC since: October 2019

How long have you been running ? What made you take it up?: Since 2004. Some friends persuaded me to do a sprint triathlon, I could swim and cycle but couldn’t run at all. Somehow managed the 5k in the tri, and next thing I know we were signed up to a 10k.

Favourite thing about running: How accessible it is.

Favourite race distance to run: Half marathon – I find it easier to maintain a pace and they’re not as tiring as marathons 🙂

What is your main goal for this year: To discover some trail running routes. (The race goals I think are gone for this year)

Your best race/most memorable racing moment to date: Best race was Edinburgh marathon – big PB for me and got me a place in London marathon (my then home marathon), Can’t choose just one for most memorable, but I love short summer races that involve picnic/coffee/beer after.

Tell us something most people might not know about you: I cannot wink. It’s impossible.

Biggest heroes (sporting or non-sporting): Paula Radcliffe

One bit of advice you would give to someone thinking of taking up running: Start with couch to 5k.

3 things you would take with you onto a desert island: Kindle, running shoes, hammock

John Quigley: A Tribute (Paul Cotter, with assistance from Pat Murphy)

On behalf of Eagle AC it is a pleasure to acknowledge the great contribution John Quigley has made to the welfare and growth of the club over many years. As John leaves the club it is good to recall his many contributions over these years. John joined Eagle AC in 1998 from Leevale at a time when numbers were falling. The club had been formed in 1982, among its founding members at that time were Joe and Ann Murphy, happily still very much part of the club. Pat Murphy joined a few years later.

John was our chairman from 2000 to 2014. When he was first elected numbers were in freefall and by 2001 there were just 25 members. This situation was not unique to Eagle, back then running was not in any way as popular as it has become over recent years. Perhaps John’s most enduring legacy to the club was his almost obsessional belief in the value of recruitment. Everywhere he went he recruited, at the end of every race, in his social life, at his place of work, and so on. John recruited me in November of 2001 while I was attending a genealogy evening at the Cork Family History Centre. He recognized my face from the races and sold me the idea of the value of club membership over being a mere jogger. Another one of his recruitment tools was a ladies meet and train evening in Douglas every Monday, which brought many members into the club. By 2003 John had gotten the numbers up to 51 and membership continued to grow apace, eventually rising to the high one hundreds (today we have around 140 members). During these years Eagle was one of the fastest growing clubs in the country. Outside of his work in recruitment John was a leading force in encouraging club members to compete in road and cross-country races, especially in championship races.

Over his years as chairman of the club John ‘ate, drank and slept’ Eagle. During his chairmanship John oversaw many honours brought home by the club at national, provincial and county level. During this time Eagle won thirty eight sets of county cross-country medals, including twelve titles, most notable of which was the three in a row county senior women’s titles, in 2008 to 2010. Earlier, in 2002, the women had won all before them, including Intermediate, Novice and Novice B. Among his other achievements for the club was his prominance in the setting up the famous Eagle ‘Cheetah Run’ in Fota Wildlife Park which has run every year since 2009 (until sadly this year). As a qualified course measurer John also made himself available to many local clubs as well as Eagle. John himself was no mean runner. With PB’s of 16:52 for five km, 21:37 for four mile and 27:30 for five mile distances he won many prizes, team and individual. In 2007, at the club’s 25^th anniversary celebration in the Cork Cricket Club on the Mardyke, John was presented with an ‘outstanding contribution’ award by the club.

On a personal level John and myself were fierce competitors, despite him being several years older than me. Many is the race that I, eye balls out, was striding to the finish line only to hear behind me a spectator shouting ‘come on John’, thus spurring me on to glory at his expense. My only national medal was won as part of the over-50 Eagle team at the Dublin marathon in 2010 when we won silver. The team was, respectively, Pat Twomey, John Quigley and myself. Another happy memory is the only time I managed to finish the Ballycotton Five Summer Series, back in 2003, coming in at 35^th position and winning the coveted top fifty tee-shirt. Who was ten seconds in front of me in 34^th position? John Quigley of course. This wonderful rivalry unfortunately came to an end some years ago when John experienced ill-health. He has faced this situation with great courage and remains an example of how important running can be in all of life’s situations.

On behalf of Eagle AC we would like to wish John many more years of running.

2019 was a very successful year for Eagle AC with National medals being won by no fewer than 14 different club members.

To recognise and to mark the huge accomplishment of winning a National medal the club had a number of commemorative pins made.

As no awards ceremony can be arranged over the coming weeks, club captain Damian Kenneally will be in touch with the recipients to arrange presentation of these.

A huge well done to all those concerned and thanks to Damian and to the Eagle AC committee for their work in organizing them.

Those Eagle AC members being awarded with pins for the 2019 season are :

Aoife Cooke ( Dublin Marathon – Senior Female Gold- National Marathon Champion, Senior Team Bronze)

Sandra Manning ( Dublin Marathon- Senior Team Bronze )

Catherine Murphy ( Dublin Marathon – Senior Team Bronze)

Mark Smith (Dublin Marathon – M40 Gold)

Martin Leahy (Dublin Marathon M55 – Silver, M50 Team Gold)

Brian McGuire (Dublin Marathon- M50 Team Gold)

Tom Fox (Dublin Marathon- M50 Team Gold)

Damian Kenneally (National Masters XC – Cork Team Silver)

Richard Piotrowski ( National Masters Track and Field Championships – M70 5000m Gold)

Ken Higgs (National Masters XC- M65 Club Silver , National Indoor Masters- M65 Bronze 200m, M65 Silver 400m, National Masters Track and Field – M65 400M Silver, 800m Silver)

John Quigley (National Masters XC – M65 Club Silver)

Pat Twomey (National Masters XC- M65 Club Silver)

Hugh McSweeney (National Indoor Masters – M70 Gold 60m, M70 Gold 200m, National Masters Track and Field M70 100m Gold, 200m Gold)

Neil Kingston (National Indoor Masters- M45 Bronze 800m) )

Eagle AC Member Profile:

Name: Anne Lucey Murphy
Member of Eagle AC since: I first joined in 1984.

How long have you been running what made you take it up:
I first started running in 1984, I wanted to run the minimarathon it was 10k then but I ended up doing the Dublin Marathon!

Favourite thing about running:
I think the high you get when you have a good race. Having a great chat after with the rest of the runners over a cup of tea also.

Favourite race distance to run:
My favourite then was the ten milers, but now i appreciate doing the 5k.

What is your main goal for this year:
To keep staying fit and to get over injuries.

Your best race/most memorable racing moment to date:
My first marathon in Dublin 1984,I was so delighted to finish it.My most memorable run was the Breakfast Run in New York before the marathon.

Tell us something most people might not know about you:
I was a pitch and putt player

Biggest heroes (sporting or non-sporting):
My biggest hero would have to be Sonia without a doubt, the next was the golfer Severiano Ballesteros know as Seve!

One bit of advice you would give to someone thinking of taking up running:
My advice would be start small, easy steps first, listen to your own body

3 things you would take with you onto a desert island:
First I would take a few murder books, next would have to be Joe and then of course, my running shoes