Photos: Tomás Greally/Sportsfile

Remembering in the Rain

The wet and blustery weather conditions provided a stern challenge for over three and a half thousand participants last year in the fourth annual Remembrance Run 5k – a Walk, Jog or Run event organised by Athletics Ireland.

A group of sixty-five Gardai took part in the event in memory of two fallen colleagues- Anthony Golden and Adrian Donohoe and all around the course there were family and friends participating in memory of loved ones passed.

A minute’s silence at the start was followed by a lone piper playing Amazing Grace and then the participants were set on their way by legendary Irish runner Harry Gorman who was celebrating his 76th birthday. Another athletics icon, Olympic 1500m Champion, Ronnie Delany, was also there to cheer the participants and encourage them.

There was a lovely touch too at the half- way mark as participants were treated to an uplifting set of fiddle tunes by Maurice Lennon, founding member of Stocktons Wing. This was a unique, deeply emotive, inspirational and very special day in the Phoenix Park as participants had to negotiate the various hills, bends and puddles on their journey to the finish line- a bit like life itself.

Jack O’Leary from Mullingar Harries led the way home and was awarded the Con Houlihan Memorial Trophy and Catherina McKiernan was the first woman to cross the finish line. But this was a day when everyone who finished was a winner and a day when finishing times did not matter. It was all about Remembrance – a primal need/wish to be remembered in some special way- that everyone harbours once and a while.