Another NI record for Ann-Marie

ANN-MARIE McGlynn showed no ill-effects from lockdown and the resulting break in competitive action when she broke the Northern Ireland 10K women’s record at the Down Royal Racecourse 10K on Saturday.

McGlynn, who was in exemplary form before restrictions were put in place for the March lockdown, showed, amazingly, that she has come out the other side in even better form. She clocked 32.43 minutes to win the women’s race by more than two minutes over North Down AC’s Jessica Craig.

The Strabane woman gained a top 20 finish overall in a race that was won by Stephen Scullion, Clonliffe Harriers, in a very fast time of 29.13 minutes.

Ann-Marie’s time, in addition to being a PB, put her top of the all-time list in Northern Ireland for 10K on the road.

She was already Northern Ireland’s fastest ever half marathon runner and marathon runner but she is now in the F40 category and her time is a new Irish F40 road 10K best time. Her performance took a mammoth one minute and 45 seconds off the existing record, held since 2014 by ex-Olympian, Catherina McKiernan. No F40 runner in Britain has bettered Ann-Marie’s time this year and only one, Priscilla Welch (1985), has ever beaten that time.

It is 13 seconds faster than the best F40 time posted by the highly rated Jo Pavey, the only British runner to ever compete in five Olympic Games.

Unsurprisingly, Ann-Marie was thrilled by her performance, but she was equally as pleased just to be back in a competitive environment.

“I’m delighted with the time, it’s cemented where I thought I was. You can train all the time, but until you get to a race and you find that extra five or 10 per cent, I definitely felt that I was at where I thought I was with my training,” she explained.

“Everyone was so happy to be racing on Saturday and you could see it in people, the excitement of there being a race. People were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.”

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