Thanks to Ronan Brennan for this report from last Saturdays Muckno Triathlon;
"Last Saturday July 17th saw the second staging of the Muckno Mania Triathlon in Castleblayney Co. Monaghan, hosted by the newly formed
Muckno Tri Club. It's a sprint distance event and attracted over 250 competitors from all over the country. It's a two hour spin from Sligo.
The event is staged around the beautiful Lough Muckno . The swim was a 750 m circuit in the lake. Quite a change from the visibility levels of swimming at Rosses Point, but I had got in a few times in the weeks before so was accustomed to the conditions.Weather conditions were nice on the day, some sun but a nice wind blew up on the bike course.
Bizarrely there was only one wave for the swim but I managed to avoid much of the scrum early on so exited the water with all my teeth and limbs in order. The run to T1 was150 mtrs up a steep hill to the Hope Castle to collect the bike. Bike route was a circuit of the lake (18km exactly) with a nice flat start . There were a couple of nice hills at the 10km mark ,but very scenic views of the lake spurred us on. The wind proved to be a real menace however. The run then was a 5km circuit of the forest. A lovely trail with only one hill to climb ( the last 200metres),taking us through the forest and around the lake. The winner came in in 52:55( holy cow), results can be found on chipit.ie. I was delighted with my time of 1:11:01.
So overall an excellent race , really well organised ( 2 waves next year?) generally and loads of lovely food afterwards.There is festival on in the town for the weekend so there was a great buzz around."
