Women's Mini Marathon in Dublin attracts 28,000 participants
Some 28,000 women (and some men) filled Dublin city streets from Fitzwilliam Place to Merrion Square on Sunday morning for the Women's Mini Marathon.
The winner of the 10km event was Grace Richardson (26), from Kilkenny City Harriers, who crossed the line after 34 minutes and 17 seconds. She followed in the footsteps of her sister Aoibhe, who won the race in 2019, and her other sister Niamh, who came third in last year's event.
Grace Richardson, from Kilkenny City Harriers, winner of the 2025 Women's Mini Marathon. Photograph: Alan Betson
Among those who signed up for the race were first-time runners, seasoned athletes and a dedicated group of women who have taken part every year since 1983. The youngest participant was just 14, while the oldest was aged 89.
Orla O'Rourke from Stepaside was hoping to jog half of the route but said she may well be 'reduced' to walking the remaining five kilometres.
READ MORE
Ms O'Rourke said she had just returned from England on Saturday night, getting off the aircraft at midnight.
Orla O'Rourke (left) and Leanne Culligan ran the Women's Mini Marathon in Dublin on Sunday. Photograph: Tim O'Brien
She said she would not miss the mini marathon as she was running in memory of her mother, Marie Hendley, who passed away from cancer some years ago.
She was running with her friend Leanne Culligan from Belgriffin. Ms Culligan she had cancer some years ago and was running to raise awareness of the disease.
At the corner of Merrion Square and Fitzwilliam Street, giant screens showed crowds of runners waiting at barriers from Lower Mount Street to Leeson Street Upper. Friends and families supported from behind barriers.
Over the loudspeakers, drag artist Dame Stuffy from 98FM could be heard commenting on the countdown to the start of the race.
'I feel like [it's] New Year's Eve,' she said.
'Where is the prosecco? Can we have a round of applause for the sunshine?' she asked, as some ominous-looking clouds parted.
On the corner of Upper Mount Street was a runner called David Nolan, who had a questionable auburn hair arrangement.
He said he was running to support his sister Yvonne Nolan, who was standing beside him. 'We are running for Saplings Rathfarnham, a school for autism,' said Ms Nolan. 'I am just here to help,' her brother added.
Yvonne Nolan and her brother David Nolan ran the Women's Mini Marathon in aid of Saplings School in Rathfarnham. Photograph: Tim O'Brien
Further numbers of men in brightly coloured wigs wore running tops with the words 'in memory of Cathy' on their backs.
Earlier, VHI mini-marathon 'ambassador' Nathalie Lennon, from Baltinglass, in Co Wicklow, confessed to having nerves. As ambassador and a qualified personal trainer and nutritionist, she had devised three fitness programmes for runners, joggers and walkers. 'I am nervous yes, but it is a good sign that you care and have a passion after the long days of training,' she said.
Fellow ambassador Clóda Scanlon, originally from Co Tipperary but living in Dublin, said she was hoping to complete the 10km in about an hour and 20 minutes. 'I have been playing sport all my life and was playing camogie in Tipperary for the under-16s,' she said.
Claire Fagan from Mullingar Harriers AC came second in the mini marathon with a time of 34.35. Jessica Craig of North Down AC took third place with 34.55. Sinéad Kane from Le Chéile AC won the visually impaired category with a time of 44.26.
Separately,
Cork County Council
said it was 'deeply saddened' to confirm a participant in the Cork City Marathon died on Sunday.
'The person was attended to immediately by the emergency services on the scene. Our deepest condolences go out to the family and friends of the deceased.'
It is understood the woman, who was in her 20s, became unwell after crossing the finish line on Patrick Street.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Times
30 minutes ago
- Irish Times
Woman killed in road traffic collision in Donegal
A woman in her seventies has been killed in a road traffic collision in Co Donegal. She died after the incident on the R245 at Bunlin Bridge, Milford, Co Donegal on Friday evening. The collision, involving a car and a van, occurred at approximately 7.30pm. The victim was pronounced dead at the scene. Her body was removed to Letterkenny University Hospital where a postmortem examination took place. READ MORE The male driver of the van, aged in his 50s, was taken to Letterkenny University Hospital for treatment of non life-threatening injuries. There were no other injuries reported. The woman's death was the only road traffic fatality of the bank holiday weekend. By contrast two people died on Irish roads over the May bank holiday weekend, three were killed over Easter and three more during the February bank holiday weekend.
RTÉ News
an hour ago
- RTÉ News
Rachel Graham: Ireland's vulnerability to opposition counter-attacks is 'worrying'
The Republic of Ireland's vulnerability to being picked off on the break is an area that needs to be addressed as quickly as possible, according to former international Rachel Graham. The Girls in Green will round off their UEFA Women's Nations League group campaign against Slovenia this evening at Páirc Uí Chaoimh (live on RTÉ2 and the RTÉ Player) - the same side that thrashed Carla Ward's team 4-0 earlier in the pool phase - and with only a victory by four clear goals or more being enough to finish top and claim automatic promotion to League A. Ireland go into the game off the back of a 2-1 victory over Turkey but the overall performance on Friday left as many questions as answers with the Irish team starting slowly before needing a late rally to turn defeat into victory in Istanbul. Speaking on the RTÉ Soccer Podcast, Shelbourne midfielder Graham felt Ireland's display highlighted areas of concern against a Turkish side ranked well below the Girls in Green. "Obviously the most important thing was the win and that's what they got so that's the main takeaway from the game but I feel it's kind of the same narrative after every time we win a game where we've got the win but it hasn't been the most convincing or most comfortable win," she said. "And I get these so-called weaker teams have gotten better in the last few years. But we've also got better the last few years and we have players playing at a good level, so I don't think we can keep saying that as an excuse because we are improving too. "Look, I don't think it was all doom and gloom. I think there were some passages of play where we were good and moved the ball really well. But it's always just in passages, it's never for the full 90 minutes or duration of the game, where we let sloppiness creep in and we give the ball away cheaply or we make the wrong decision in the final third. "Even the goals that we got were two pieces of luck. It's an own goal for the first one and then if the centre-half doesn't slip, we don't get the second." But it's the defensive aspect that is more concerning from Graham's point of view with a propensity for Ireland to leak chances particularly when the ball is turned over in attacking areas. "We are conceding a lot of chances to these so-called weaker nations which is a bit worrying," she said. "I think the biggest takeaway, if we don't beat Slovenia by four goals and do go into that play-off, it's how vulnerable we look when we are attacking. "You could see we were trying to win the ball high up the pitch and when it doesn't work out, it's a long ball and we do get caught out with it. "Even our back-line it's not the quickest, so if a ball gets in behind and we're high up, it's a real struggle for us to get back and you saw that in the Turkey game. That's where their goal comes from and when we played Slovenia the last time that seemed to be a problem as well. "Overall it's a win (over Turkey), it's a good win to come back from 1-0 down but I don't know if it's papering over cracks, but there's definitely issues that we need to get right, if not for Slovenia, then for the play-off."
Irish Times
an hour ago
- Irish Times
Leaving Cert parent: ‘Is there any chance we can have the kitchen table back?'
June 2022: I'm driving my middle daughter to school on the first Friday of the Junior Cert exams. I know geography and maths are on the day's agenda, so ask which one is first. - 'Don't know.' - 'I mean, which one do you have in the morning, and which in the afternoon?' - 'I know what you mean. I've no idea.' READ MORE - 'Sorry, you don't know the Junior Cert exam you are sitting in about 40 minutes?' - 'Not my job. My job is to be in the right room at the right time, the invigilator's job is to hand me the right exam paper.' I later tell my parents the story. They think it is hilarious. When I was in school, I was ridiculously laid-back about State exams, which had the effect of raising the blood pressure of everyone else. What comes around ... Five minutes ago, they were holding your hand on the way to primary school, coming home with schoolwork you could understand, answering questions about their day that didn't start and stop with just the word 'fine'. [ 'I worry that my anxious son will buckle under pressure during the Leaving Cert' Opens in new window ] Now, she is facing into the Leaving Certificate exams. And, just for fun, the youngest will be sitting the Junior Certificate at the same time. A couple of weeks after they finish, the eldest of the three girls – who already has the Leaving Cert, university and several years work under her belt – will emigrate to Canada. It's all go in this house at the moment. Two weeks ago, the Co Tipperary school my Leaving Cert girl attends held a beautiful graduation ceremony for the sixth years, with the theme being, 'A Million Dreams for the World We're Going to Make'. It resonated, effortlessly taking my wife Deirdre and me back more than 16 years – to October 2008 – when, amid seemingly never-ending appointments with various medical experts, one gestured towards our then two-year-old during an examination and matter-of-factly stated: 'You know, she'll never do a day of primary school.' It was a body blow. Devastating. At the time, we had been worn down by vague and non-committal prognoses by many medical experts, but how we wished that consultant had also couched her words instead of deciding to tell us straight. Our two-year-old had been diagnosed with a clatter of conditions by then, among the most serious being ocular motor apraxia (a neurological condition with the inability to voluntarily move the eyes), monocular vision and dyspraxia. An autism diagnosis would come later, which if nothing else gave us a box to tick when we were required to fill in a form (rare diseases rarely appear on official forms). I have written about her once before – when she was 6½. In early 2013 there was still much uncertainty as to what the immediate future held ... but, by then, she had started mainstream primary school. In your face, one particular consultant. [ The Irish Times view on Leaving Cert reforms: AI must be taken seriously Opens in new window ] In that piece, I wrote that whatever challenge she would face next, 'she'll meet it the same way she has in her first six years – allowing her infectious enthusiasm and determination to define her, not any medical condition. We couldn't be more proud of her.' Twelve years later, we're watching her – standing beside her friends and peers – celebrating completing their final year of secondary school. So, maybe there's good reason why the Leaving Certificate doesn't feel like the biggest challenge of her life. Because, well, it's not. She's already scaled far higher, far scarier mountains. It has meant the world has not stopped in this house because there's a child doing the Leaving Cert. In fact, she didn't even give up, or even scale down, the one extra-curriculum activity that means absolutely everything – anything related to drama and theatre. My Junior and Leaving Cert girls were involved in a play performed as recently as May. For weeks before the show, when either child was asked were they studying, a follow-up question was required: apart from lines for a play? The Leaving Cert student has, however, recently lost the ability to do even the simplest of household tasks. All the usual, everyday rules have gone out the window. - 'Will you empty and fill the dishwasher?' - 'Sorry, can't. Doing the Leaving Cert.' - 'Are you eating jelly beans for breakfast?' - 'Yes, I'm doing the Leaving Cert.' - 'Is there any chance we can have the kitchen table back?' - 'Sorry.' Our kitchen table at the moment. Since normal school classes ended, there has been a sudden realisation that we're now on the final straight. However laid-back you are, the Leaving Certificate is a monster – the fog is clearing and Irish education's Oilliphéist is coming into view. It is almost impossible to remain calm as it approaches, with the pace appearing to quicken. Still, we're taking it in our stride as best we can. Yesterday morning, I woke the Leaving Cert girl around 8am. Why was I disturbing her when she didn't have school? You don't have school, I said, because the Leaving Cert is a few days away. Oh, ya. Okay. Fine. I'll get up soon. Whatever happens in the next few weeks, we know she'll meet the challenge like all others. The Leaving Cert won't define her. We couldn't be prouder of her.
