from Eagle AC Written by John Quigley
This month’s featured athlete is long time Club Secretary and Registrar, Pat Murphy
Eagle AC is very lucky to have a member such as Pat Murphy. Pat is a very talented runner and a huge asset to the club in terms of the invaluable background work he carries out with absolutely no fuss. Pat joined the club way back in 1988, and has been on the club committee since then, first as Registrar, Chairman for 3 years in the mid to late 90’s and currently as Secretary.
Pat hasn’t always been a member of Eagle AC, his first club was actually a small northside club called Northern Athletic Club, which he joined while a student at the North Mon. The club is long since gone, but at the time it comprised of a bunch of young enthusiastic runners, who competed in mostly cross country, and novice road races. Also in the club were present Eagle member, Paddy Hegarty and his brother Denis , and another name that may be familiar to some people, one Pat Falvey, that’s the chap who now spends his time climbing Everest and taking ordinary folks on extraordinary adventures, such as trips to the North pole (from the north mon to the north pole) by all accounts Falvey was a handy runner at that time. Another present day Eagle link with Northern AC is Laurence Courtney who also spent some time with the club in his younger days.
When Pat started to work, running was put on hold. But I guess if it’s in your blood to run, it’ll find a way out, and in Pats case the stimulus was the first Cork city marathon back in 1982. Pat trained for 6 or 7 weekends in the lead up to this marathon, which at the time he assumed was reasonably adequate. After slogging through the 26 miles in a time of 4:01, Pat uttered that post marathon mantra “never again”. But it’s hard to get rid of marathon / running fever, and as soon as the posters went up for Cork 1983 marathon, Pat was off training again. His training was not particularly structured, however he finished this marathon in a pb of 3:39. Then Pat kept the habit of training regularly, using the hills of Corks northside to strengthen him as a runner. He was accompanied by his old club and school mates, Paddy and Denis Hegarty. These boys only knew one way to train, and like Pat explained, every training run almost became a race. As a result Pat ran his first Ballycotton 10 in 64 minute, followed by the Cork half marathon one week later and Cork to Cobh the following week in driving sleet (the race used to be held in March in those days). Pat raced the Cork marathon a few weeks later and finished with the same time as the previous year, the races in the lead up appeared to have taken their toll, he had expected to improve on his previous time, but a valuable racing lesson was learned.
Later in 1984 Pat ran his first Dublin city marathon, the lads arrived in Dublin the day before the race, and hit the beer, what else would a few lads up from the country do in the big smoke. Got up, ran the race in a time of 3.59 and still had a hangover when he finished, this guy is made of hard stuff. I’d imagine “never again” was uttered a few times during and after that particular race (whether it applied to running or drinking, well that’s debatable).
The slogan used for the Cork 800 celebration in 1985 was “Come alive in 85”. This certainly seemed to be the case for Pat. On New Year’s Day Pat raced 10 miles in Youghal, breaking the 60 minute barrier for the first time, roll on March and the Ballycotton 10, and the 60 minutes got broken again. Cork marathon, Easter Monday, and Pat breaks 3 hours, 2.59 and change, “I came alive in 85”.
At the time Pat was running for St. Finbarrs AC. Thankfully for our club, due to the persuasive powers of his long time friends and training partners, Paddy and Denis Hegarty, Pat transferred to Eagle in 1988. In those days, Eagle AC was numerically a small club, but none the less very competitive and successful, with the likes of the Hegarty brothers, Timmy Morrissey, Joe Murphy, Liam Doherty, Ted Twomey, Eddie Noonan, Tommy Ryan and now Pat, and on the ladies side they had Monica Twohig, Noreen Lenihan and Fidelma Kirwan. In Pat’s first season with the club, they won the County novice cross country, and the County intermediate in 3 out of the next 4 seasons. The training sessions at the track were pretty intense and not for the faint hearted, in the build up to half marathons for instance, the lads would train 3 mile continuous at 5.40 mile pace, and other sessions were your standard mile repeats at sub 5.20 pace. When we asked Pat his favourite training session he replied, “a nice slow run”, which I guess is true for us all, but he feels the most effective session for him are mile repeats with equal time recoveries.
Pat enjoys racing over most terrains and is quite comfortable over most distances, but he most enjoys, 10 mile races and half marathons. His pbs over varied distances are 16.39 for the UCC 5km which used to be hosted by the BHAA, 21.39 for 4 miles, a time he equalled on two occasions, firstly at the Marina and again in the Munster road championships in Tralee, this time didn’t even qualify him for a place on the winning Eagle team, Pat was pushed into 5th Eagle finisher by Joe Murphy. Over 5 miles Pat has raced 27.23 in the Newmarket to Kanturk race, a great race which is making a comeback this year. 34.41 for 10 km in Dungarvan. 56.08 for the Ballycotton 10 in 1993, when he crossed the line in 99th place (that time would easily put you in top 30 place these days). Pat regularly trashed out 57 – 58 minutes in Ballycotton, and nearly always managed to squeeze inside the top 100. When the St Finbarrs Cork half marathon used to be held in the city, starting on the South Mall and finishing outside the Opera House, Pat clocked a time of 74.06(still has the photo passing under the clock at the finish) but does not consider this as a PB as he suspects that the course was slightly short. Pat has a few half marathons in and around 75 – 76 mins. His marathon pb came in Dublin in 1997 in a time of 2.47.06.
There is another side to Pat’s running, he’s also a mountain runner. Pat and the lads stumbled across mountain running around 1990 91, when Gerry McGrath told them about 3 upcoming mountain runs, on Corrin near Fermoy, on Killavullen near Mallow and one near Macroom. They reckoned they’d use these races as training runs, but true to their early days the training runs became races. In 1992, Paddy heard of a mountain race on Croagh Patrick. The previous winning time made him think that the Eagle boys could do a bit of damage up there. So off they struck for Mayo and sure enough first to return from the summit was the Eagle, Denis Hegarty, followed by five other Cork runners, including Paddy, Eddie Noonan, Tommy Ryan, Pat and Kevin Cooney from Midleton. Pat also got roped into the secretary’s job for the Munster Branch of the Irish Mountain Runners Association, a post he still holds today. Pat has always managed to get a few eagles involved in the fun side of mountain running, if such a thing exists. Pat and a few members of the club ventured to the Wicklow way, a 107 mile relay race across the Wicklow Mountains, and as anyone who has participated will tell you, it’s an incredible event. Lastly, Pat raced on mount Snowdon in Wales as part of an Irish mountain racing team.
Pat also used his running as an excuse to travel, he competed twice in London, miraculously finished the Berlin marathon in 2005 with a calf injury picked up around 17 miles in a time of 2.59 (possibly a bad idea, Pat was more or less sidelined for all of 2006) Pat has also raced in Vancouver, Krakow, Annecy, the great north in Newcastle, Barcelona, Amsterdam and last year in the Edinburgh half marathon where he took the podium position in the over 50 category.
Pat’s achievements on the road and in the fields around this country and others are pretty impressive, i.e. novice County and Munster team gold, intermediate team gold County and Munster, national bronze at masters level and senior b County gold. But Pat’s proudest running moment came on the track in 2007 when he won an All Ireland bronze in the masters 1500 meters, Pat trained hard for this race with the help of training partner Ann Marie Healy, under the guidance of long time Eagle member and coach Liam Doherty. Pat’s other track achievements are 3000 metres Munster silver, and indoor track 3000 metres gold and 1500 metres silver.
Pat Murphy, the quite man of Eagle AC, a hugely respected athlete on the local and national running scene. Goes about his business in an unassuming way, work, train, socialise, walk the dogs and keep Eagle AC ticking over.
I think it’s fair to say, “Eagle AC are extremely lucky to have a member such as Pat Murphy”
Thanks Pat!