Successful week for Pegasus AC!

In the past week, Pegasus AC has unquestionably had their week to date this season, with admirable performances in road and mountain running across Northern Ireland.

The Scott & Gault 10 Mile road race took place on the 12 th August in Ballyclare, with Pegasus athletes looking forward to running in lovely and sunny weather (which has been seriously lacking in August so far)! First Pegasus athlete home was Coleraine’s “Marathon man” Harry Reilly, who achieved a terrific personal best of 66 minutes and 10 seconds over a course with a few challenging hills Harry’s 19 th overall shows he has prepared well for the up and coming Cardiff City Marathon in September, where he is hoping to finally break his year long personal best.

Three Pegasus ladies made it out for this race, all having a crack at the 10 mile distance for the first time. Shirley Park came back into some form as she took a solid 5 th in the Open women’s category and 8 th overall in a great time of 81:07, another leading performance from the Pegasus women’s coach. The ever battling Linda Gillen was the next women across the line in 82:54 and finishing 6 th female open, showing her progression from running novice to regular competitor. Tess McComb completed a terrific run to finish 40 seconds behind Linda and take a fist ever athletic win since she started with the club, winning the V40 category. On a lighter note, congratulations to Springwell’s Kenny Bacon, who was awarded the best prize in NI athletics… a chocolate cake in the post race prize giving!

On Wednesday past, Pegasus had 2 athletes running at the Scrabo Hill Race, Round 1 of the North Down Country Park Challenge event at Newtownards, incorporating the NI Junior Mountain Running Championships. Pegasus junior Jason Wilson competed in the 3.5 miles Open race along with the other Under 18 runners to fight for limited places in the NI team. Jason managed a fast but steady start, watching other potential rivals around him. At the 1 mile mark, he decided to set off in his quest to gain the NI crown. He passed the then leader Darrell Brogan from Omagh Harriers but was quickly followed by Ciaran Collins. They tussled with one another for the next mile, though unfortunately Ciaran put in a last mile surge to pull away and win the NI U18 title. Jason managed to finish 2 nd U18 and 11 th overall athlete in 24:27, only 7 seconds behind the Omagh runner but an NI International for the 3 rd time now!! Michael Henry made his comeback after an agonising 3 months out of action since his great Belfast Marathon performance all the way back in May. He was still feeling the affects of an Achilles injury, but knew he could definitely aim for a solid top half finish. After both shoelaces becoming untied and a wrong turn later, Michael managed this aim the hard way! His time of 28:15 left him 6 th Vet 45 and learning a valuable lesson! Visit www.pegasusac.org.uk for more information on club matters and training dates.