My only tip-off was that the park bench in question was somewhere east of Marlay House, within the small cluster of trees around the Grange Road entrance. After that it should be easily identified as the one freshly inscribed with the name Jerry Kiernan.
My search began earlier this week, and promptly reminded me of that scene from In the Name of the Father, where Gerry Conlon’s solicitor Gareth Peirce (deftly played by Emma Thompson) is snooping around park benches in London in between young couples trying to find an old inscription made by the Charlie Burke character, Conlon’s only alibi after he was falsely convicted of the Guildford pub bombings in October 1974, 50 years ago this month.
The same piece of evidence that in Conlon’s trial was marked “not to be shown to the defence”.
Kiernan’s inscription soon revealed itself, suitably illuminated by the bright autumn sunshine, a small golden plaque at the top of the park bench with the words:
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In memory of Jerry Kiernan, 31 May 1953 – 21 January 2021
Whether or not this was deliberately planned for the run-up to Sunday’s Dublin Marathon is unclear, but it’s a nonetheless timely and fitting tribute, given Kiernan’s still enduring influence and impact on the event. With the possible exception of Dublin Marathon co-founder Noel Carroll, Kiernan is still the one athlete who comes to my mind when the event rolls around every October bank holiday.
It was said to me later that this part of south county Dublin wasn’t really Kiernan’s old ground, unlike say Belfield, or Leopardstown Racecourse. As a matter of fact, one of Kiernan’s all-time favourite runs, both from his own competitive days and later when coaching his many young proteges, was up the brutally steep climb of Kilmashogue Lane, just out the top entrance to Marlay Park off College Road.
Go back over the previous 42 editions of the Dublin Marathon, and few if any athletes tore into the classic distance with greater intent than Kiernan did in 1982, when making his marathon debut. Then aged 29, Kiernan had watched the first two editions of the event, Dick Hooper winning the first race in 1980, then Neil Cusack in 1981, and reasoned that he had regularly beat those two on the roads.
So, by the 15-mile marker, Kiernan was running close to the world record, his Clonliffe Harriers club-mate David Taylor acting as a sort of unofficial pacemaker alongside him. Despite stopping to walk three times before the finish around Merrion Square, Kiernan still won in 2:13:47, which would stand as the Dublin course record until 2004.
Kiernan would win Dublin again in 1992, and the lesson of that first race perhaps applied most memorably at the 1984 Olympic marathon in LA, where he moved more sensibly through the miles to finish ninth in a lifetime best of 2:12:20.
Incidentally, there was also a memorial bench unveiled for Carroll a few years back at his home village of Annagassan in Co Louth, right where the river Glyde enters the Irish Sea, directly overlooking the small harbour and across the road from the house where Carroll was born and raised.
It’s inscribed with one of Carroll’s many still enduring running quotes – “There’s a time to train and a time to rest; it is a true test of the runner to get them both right” – which for every runner I know still has lasting purpose and meaning.
When Carroll helped start up that first Dublin Marathon in 1980, of course he felt obliged to run it too, even though it was a long way off his best distance of 800m. “It’s not the distance that kills, it’s the pace,” he would later say of the marathon, wise words that still ring perfectly true.
Carroll’s sudden death this weekend 16 years ago – mid-stride, as it were, after his regular lunchtime training run around UCD – still feels unfathomable. Carroll was only 56, the embodiment of clean living and physical fitness, the sadly gentle irony being he died of a suspected heart attack doing what he loved to do all of his life.
So much of what Carroll achieved came from the heart of distance running, and when it came to the art itself, he lived by his first and most lasting mantra: “You either ran today or you didn’t.”
Indeed Carroll’s memorial bench at Annagassan could be inscribed with any one of those many enduring running quotes; “Have you run yet today?”; “If you find yourself too busy to run on any given day, then you’re too busy”; or my old favourite, “There is no such thing as bad weather, only weak runners”.
When after Kiernan’s death following a short illness in January of 2021, aged 67, his long-time friend, training partner and running ally Murt Coleman first toyed with the idea of setting up the Jerry Kiernan Foundation, the intention was two-fold. Yes, to raise some funds for the young athletes who might not otherwise be eligible for financial assistance, but also as a way to keep giving back some of what Kiernan still left behind, remembering him not just in words but some meaning too.
Coleman also saw how even a little financial support could go a long way. In 1984, the headmaster at Kiernan’s old school, St Brigid’s in Foxrock, had raised, without any request, a small contribution towards Kiernan’s Olympic preparations that summer. It afforded him the chance to travel to Los Angeles well in advance and complete the acclimatisation process.
Speaking to me ahead of Sunday’s Dublin Marathon, Hugh Armstrong, the 30-year-old from Mayo who is also one of the favourites to win the national marathon title, highlighted some of the difficulties of effectively training full-time for marathon (his best time is 2:12:26), while also working full-time (Armstrong has been an accountant with An Post since 2022), and all without any sponsor.
“I’d love to go full-time, if I could afford it, or even take a few months off to focus only on training for a short period of time,” Armstrong said, before also stressing his appreciation for the small financial assistance he gets from the Jerry Kiernan Foundation.
The sort of small touches that Kiernan himself always appreciated.
