SPORTSWOMAN OF THE MONTH:March joint-winners: Nina Carberry(horse racing), Derval O'Rourke(athletics)

IT REACHED a point in March when the judges for The Irish Times/Irish Sports Council Sportswoman awards began to live in dread of yet more positive Irish sporting news, envisioning having to split the monthly prize between half a dozen of our finest sportswomen.

We were only 10 days in to the month when Mary Cullen and Derval O’Rourke had won bronze medals at the European Indoor Championships in Turin and Nina Carberry had triumphed yet again at the Cheltenham Festival.

Cullen, at least, had done us a favour by ruling herself out of the running for March, having already collected the February award for breaking Sonia O’Sullivan’s 1997 3,000 metres indoor record.

So, when O’Rourke rediscovered some of the form that won her our 2006 Sportswoman of the Year award by clinching bronze in the 60-metres hurdles in Turin, we reckoned that was March neatly sorted.

But three days later along came Carberry on board Garde Champetre, once again winning the Cross Country Chase at the Festival. There was as much chance of us separating O’Rourke and Carberry’s achievements as there was of us catching either of them in full flight, so a joint-award it is.

This is the fourth monthly prize Carberry has won since these awards got under way in 2004, the same number of successes she has now had at Cheltenham.

In 2005 she had her first victory at the Festival on Dabiroun in the Juvenile Novices’ Handicap Hurdle, winning the Cross Country Chase on Heads Onthe Ground in 2007 and Garde Champetre in 2008 and last month.

It was only a few days before her Cheltenham win that Carberry collected another award, the rather wordy “Outstanding Contribution made by a Lady to Jump Racing”, announced by Cheltenham Racecourse.

Among the nominees were trainers Henrietta Knight, Jenny Pitman (now retired) and Venetia Williams, who, of course, trained last weekend’s Grand National winner Mon Mome.

O’Rourke, meanwhile, helped ease the pain of two nightmarish years since winning world indoor gold and European outdoor silver in 2006, when she finished behind Belgium’s Eline Berings and the Czech Republic’s Lucie Skrobakova to take bronze in Turin.

“I’d like to think I kept the faith, but it took until today for it to be totally restored,” said O’Rourke.

Monthly awards so far: January: Jessica Kurten (equestrian). Kurten had an exceptional start to the year, the highlights in a string of top five finishes, two successive World Cup Qualifier wins in a week, in Leipzig and Zurich, lifting her back up to sixth in the world rankings.

February: Mary Cullen (athletics). The Sligo runner broke Sonia O’Sullivan’s 1997 3,000 metres indoor record at Boston University in February, before going on to win bronze at the same distance at the European Indoor Championships in Turin.

Each sportswoman is eligible for just one monthly award in 2009, but her achievements throughout the year will be taken into account by the judges when the decision on the overall winner is made.