Bronze for Ireland and McGlynn as Offaly athletes perform heroics at European Cross Country Championships

IT was a very productive day for Offaly athletes with three outstanding females competing at the European Cross Country Championships in Turin, Italy today.

Pride of place went to Ann Marie McGlynn and the Irish senior womens team who collected bronze medals in their race.

Nee Larkin and a native of Mucklagh, McGlynn was the fourth Irish woman home and was well up the field in 31st place, completing the course is a time of 28.40. Living in Strabane and racing for Letterkenny AC, McGlynn has enjoyed a remarkable Indian summer in her career in recent years and was delighted to make the Irish team for these championships again after a great at the national senior event a few weeks ago.

Winning bronze medals was a terrific achievement for Ireland. The stars of the show were the Flanagan twins from Finn Valley with Eilish 11th and Roisin 12th – both had identical times of 27.38.

Mary Mulhare of Portlaoise was the third scorer in 27th place and the Irish team was completed by Aoife Richardson (Kilkenny City Harriers) in 46th and Michelle Finn of Leevale in 55th place.

The top three finishers counted for points purposes in the team race and Germany were very impressive winners on 9 points – they had the 2nd, 3rd and 4th athletes. Great Britain and Northern Ireland were second on 30 points and Ireland took bronze on 50 points, five clear of the fourth place Spain.

McGlynn was an oustanding juvenile in Tullamore Harriers in her youth and two other members of Offaly's biggest club also competed in the championships: Tullamore's Danielle Donegan, now racing for UCD where she is on a scholarship and Cappincur's Laura Mooney, on a scholarship in Providence College, Rhode Island in the USA ran in the womens' U-23 race.

Donegan had an excellent run to be the first Irish woman home in 28th place. Donegan's time was 21.36 while Mooney was the third Irish woman home, running 22.11 in 39th place. Ireland finished 7th out of the nine teams with Great Britain and Northern Ireland taking gold, Italy silver and France bronze.

The mens U-23 team also secured bronze on a very good day for the Irish team.