Craughwell Athletics Club

Craughwell Athletic Club’s ambitious facility development has been in progress for 8 years now having commenced in 2014, and Galway Rural Development and the Community Employment Scheme have been there every step of the way with the club. From day 1 after the club’s initial purchase of the site adjacent to the primary school, the scheme’s workers have been doing Trojan work for the club under supervision of GRD’s Mary Feeney. Initially the work required lots of cutting back hedges and bushes to reclaim ground, lots of ground repair works and lots of strimming of running routes through the field.

As the 8-acre agricultural field gradually evolved into a top-class athletics facility, so too did the nature of the work for the CE Scheme workers. Every task that the club asked them to do, they did with enthusiasm and pride in their work – from filling the regular potholes that appear in the road and carpark areas, to strimming the edges of paths and fences, to weed control, to clearing up storm debris, to clipping back hedges and ivy, to small construction projects on site, to power-washing paths and sheds, to regular cleaning of the indoor building and toilets, to maintenance of the long jump pits. The list of jobs is endless and GRD and the CE Scheme workers are taking a huge workload off the shoulders of the club’s hardworking volunteer coaches which would otherwise have to be either done by them or others employed and paid to do so – when the club needs all of its limited finances to continue its facility development.

The club is delighted to see GRD and the CE Scheme reach their joint 20th year anniversary and hope its own partnership with both will reach its own significant anniversaries in years to come.

Michael Tobin Craughwell Athletics