Ireland third in Senior Home International after great relay performances

Above: Men's relay course on Crossmurin

The Senior Home International was held in conjunction with the Northern Ireland orienteering championships this weekend in Co. Fermanagh. The individual courses on Saturday were tough in both the forest and the open areas of the Burren. Scotland dominated M21 while England were unstoppable in W21. In a close contest, Wales were two points ahead of Ireland overnight. Patrick Higgins (10th) and Darren Burke (12th) led the Irish challenge in M21, while the Irish M20's impressed with Ruairi Short 5th, Kevin O'Boyle 8th and Niall Ewen 9th. In the M20 class, a mere 3 minutes separated third and eighth place, so any loss of time was costly. This was also the case in the W21 class, where 4th to 13th place were seperated by 6 minutes. Niamh O'Boyle (7th) was the top Irish finisher. In W20E, our sole representative Katarina Stefkova had a solid performance finishing in 9th place.

An evening of running analysis with Irish senior squad manager Ivan Miller and Irish team coach Kim Andre followed, and must have had a good effect on the Irish team as they brought their best performances to the relay on Crossmurin on Sunday. The team of Patrick Higgins, Darren Burke and Ruairi Short had a superb result to finish 3rd (of the scoring teams) behind the two Scottish teams and ahead of both English teams. The team of Kevin O'Boyle, Seamus O'Boyle and Gerard Butler followed this with a 6th place finish both Welsh teams. With a good points score from the men's relay, the fate of the battle with Wales lay in the women's relay. Niamh O'Boyle brought the team home in 3rd, just ahead of Wales, but they managed to get ahead of Katarina Stefkova on the second leg with a good run by W20 individual champion Anwen Darlington. Ciara Largey had a tough task, but rose to the challenge magnificantly to pass the Welsh team on the last leg to ensure overall third place and victory over Wales! Scotland retained their overall SHI team title, followed by England with Ireland 3rd and Wales 4th.

Overall points:
ENG SCO IRE WAL
M20 5 7 3 1
M21 6 8 2 4
W20 3 7 1 5
W21 8 6 4 2
Individual Total 22 28 10 12

Men 9 15 9 3
Women 15 11 4 3
Relay Total 24 26 13 6

Overall
1. Scotland 54
2. England 46
3. Ireland 23
4. Wales 18

SHI 2009, Individual Irish results

M20E
1. Alasdair McLeod (Scotland) 58:51
2. Hector Haines (Scotland) 62:38
3. Peter Hodkinson (England) 64:29
5. Ruairi Short (Ireland) 66:02
8. Kevin O'Boyle (Ireland) 67:31
9. Niall Ewen (Ireland) 86:14

W20E
1. Anwen Darlington (Wales) 53:52
2. Hollie Orr (Scotland) 54:20
3. Anne Edwards (England) 56:54
9. Katarina Stefkova (Ireland) 76:26

M21E
1. Scott Fraser (Scotland) 82:39
2. Oleg Chepelin (Scotland) 82:52
3. Doug Tullie (Scotland) 91:19
10. Patrick Higgins (Ireland) 104:40
12. Darren Burke (Ireland) 106:48
17. Gerard Butler (Ireland) 135:39
mp Steven Linton
mp Seamus O'Boyle
dns Colm Hill

W21E
1. Rachel Elder (England) 62:52
2. Pippa Whitehouse (England) 66:30
3. Victoria Stevens (England) 68:02
7. Niamh O'Boyle (Ireland) 71:53
13. Ciara Largey (Ireland) 75:41
15. Rosalind Hussey (Ireland) 80:12
17. Violet Linton (Ireland) 91:40
18. Ruth Lynam (Ireland) 91:45
20. Maeve O'Grady (Ireland) 92:41

Full individual results here: http://www.niorienteering.org.uk/res/2009/NIOC/sat/index.html
Relay results here: http://www.niorienteering.org.uk/res/2009/NIOC/sun/relay/index.html

Below: Niamh's route in W21 on the Burren