Progressive city triathlon club hosts big national event

MANY of the athletes in Galway Triathlon Club are no strangers to breaking boundaries but the distance the club, itself, has travelled in such a relatively short period of time is absolutely astounding.

Since formed by a handful of City based athletes in 2000, the membership has swelled to approximately 250 and this as much reflects the hard work the committee has put in over the years as it does the growing popularity of the three-in-one sport, namely swimming, cycling and running.

To further underline the club’s growing status, Galway Triathlon will host – for the first time ever – the National Aquathon Championships (long course) in Salthill this Saturday in conjunction with its own Aquathon Festival. Indeed, so successful was the club’s inaugural Festival last year, it was awarded the national long course championships for 2012.

Then again, when you have people like Chairman Kieran Whyte, Secretary Keith Connolly and PRO Joanne Murphy on your committee, among many others, things are bound to happen. It’s Murphy who Talking Sport catches up with on this particular day and it immediately becomes obvious that the Cork born athlete is both a force of nature and a driving force behind the club. Her enthusiasm is infinite.

A fundraising manager with Enable Ireland, Murphy, who recently completed the Mallorca 70.3 (half Ironman) in May and has qualified for the World Championships in London next year, is not only club PRO but also public relations officer for the National Aquathon Championship and official race announcer for both the UK and Ireland.

Needless to say, she is excited about hosting the club’s second annual Aquathon Festival this weekend – and, of course, the national long course championships. The event, incorporating a 2km swim and 10km run, will attract over 500 athletes. In addition to this race, there will also be short course events (1,000metre swim and 5km run) and youth races for those aged between eight and 16 years of age on the day.

“There are shorter combination races for the youths and the first of these will be off at 1:30, with the U-10s, at Grattan Beach. Then the sprint race goes off at 2:15 from Palmers Rock to Grattan Beach before the long course race gets underway at Blackrock – they swim to Grattan Beach – at 3:15pm,” outlines Murphy, whose mother Joan (nee Mullins) originally hails from Bushypark in Galway City.

In the national long course championships, all eyes will be on Bryan Keane and Bryan McCrystal. Both of these are Irish professional tri-athletes and each showed they are coming into form at the right time when securing podium finishes at the ‘Hell of the West’ in Kilkee recently.

“Bryan Keane is a former international runner and cyclist,” continues Murphy. “He was vying for the Olympics but got seriously injured in 2010 and was forced out of the race for qualification for the Olympics. He won Hell of the West recently and Bryan McCrystal was actually third.

“Bryan McCrystal is a former Leeds United player turned tri-athlete. His knees went and he couldn’t play football anymore. He turned professional last year and he was 9th at Ironman Lanzarote and he was also the second fastest man on the bike at the event. He is a huge athlete.”

While it may well come down to the two Bryans to fight it out over the spoils, there will also be a strong Galway interest in the race. Aside from the Galway Triathlon Club contingent, led by the experienced Ruaidhrí Geraghty, a number of Galwegians will be returning home to compete, including Belpark/Kenitica’s Kevin Thornton.

“We have 250 members in Galway Triathlon Club at the moment and I would say 70% of them will race and everybody after that will marshal,” says Murphy. “Obviously, we need a huge amount of marshals and support on the day.”

For more, read this week's Galway City Tribune.