Donegal world record holder Caitríona Jennings honoured at Sportswoman Awards

Donegal’s Caitríona Jennings was honoured recently at The Irish Times Sport Ireland Sportswoman of the Year awards after the ultra-runner smashed the world record for 100 miles in Illinois. 

Jennings received the Sportswoman of the Month award for November after she ran the Tunnel Hill 100 Mile in 12 hours, 37 minutes and four seconds, beating the previous best mark set in 2017 by five minutes.

Remarkably, this was the Letterkenny AC runner’s debut at the distance, with sixty miles being the longest she had run in one go before. Jennings, who turned 45 in June, had already set a string of Irish records over shorter distances. Early last year, she broke the Irish record at the Donadea 50km National Championships, and she also holds the 100km record set in 2021.

She has helped herself to multiple top-10 finishes at the Comrades Marathon, the 88km race between Durban and Pietermaritzburg, the world’s oldest ultra-marathon, and in 2022, she won the IAU 50km European Championships. Her best (regular) marathon time of 2:36.17 qualified her for the London Olympics in 2012.

But this one beat them all. Proudly wearing her Letterkenny AC colours, Jennings averaged 7:34 minutes per mile (4:42/km) in Illinois, remaining under world record pace the entire way. She finished fourth overall and almost four hours ahead of the next best woman.

“I just kept telling myself to be patient at the start,” Jennings said afterwards, her husband Martin McCoy also providing crucial food-and-drink backup on the day. “Because it’s such a long race, you have to really hold back and run slower than you would think you would anticipate when you’re usually racing, words can’t describe this feeling,” crediting her coach Terry McConnon for driving her on towards the achievement.

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Not that she had much time to celebrate it, she was back to work with Aviation Capital Group, an aircraft leasing company, the next day.

Until November, Leona and Lisa Maguire were the only sisters to win the awards since they got underway in 2004. And while lots of them have been on the monthly roll of honour, Jennings now joins her sibling, Olympic rower Sinead, on the list as the only other pair on the list.