40,000 sporting women make city their own

This year's Dublin Women's Mini-Marathon was the largest yet with 10 more competitors than last year to give a record total of 40,023 runners, walkers and wheelchair racers.

The 10km (6.2 mile) event was comfortably won as expected by late entrant Sonia O'Sullivan in a time of 33.06 minutes.

She was followed 16 seconds later by Pauline Curley from Tullamore, with Annette Kealy from Malahide, Dublin, in third place in 34.51.

The only racing wheelchair entrant was Patrice Dockrey from Swords in Dublin who covered the route in a record 27.31 minutes, while the winner in the visually impaired section was Catherine Walshe.

The Flora mini-marathon is the largest all-women event of its kind in the world.

A new feature of the event is the "champion chip" - around 4,500 women agreed to have a chip with a transmitter attached to their shoelaces which recorded their time and finishing position.

The transmitter activates when a runner passes over a mat at the start of the race and the time and place is recorded when the competitor passes a mat at the end.

Hundreds of charities were represented at the event, which is the largest single-day charity event in the country.

Last year's marathon raised an estimated €9 million for charity and even more is expected to be raised this year.

Since the marathon started in 1983 an estimated €75 million in charity funding has been raised and 473,000 people have participated.

When it began 22 years ago some 9,000 women took part. In recent years the number of entries has been in and around the 40,000 mark.

On a scorching day yesterday the organisers took the safety precaution of running the race at 3pm. A number of runners complained that there was only one drink station along the route but the organisers said the Stillorgan dual carriageway was the only safe place for such a large number of people to stop.

The route ran from Fitzwilliam Square out through Ballsbridge, on to Merrion Road and back via Stillorgan Road to finish at the Earlsfort Terrace end of Stephen's Green to avoid runners crossing the Luas terminus on St Stephen's Green.

From start to finish some 10 pop bands, two marching bands, dancers and DJs providing entertainment along the route.