The Finbar McCormack Memorial Award for Sporting Endeavour is awarded each year to a child in St. Joseph’s Primary School Carnacaville who has stood out, not because of their sporting achievements in terms of medals, trophies or certificates, but someone who has made a marked improvement or developed a sporting skill(s) or attribute(s) which is beyond expectation. This year’s nominees were Aoibha Owens, Ruairi Steele and Eamonn Blackam.
The winner of this year’s award was Ruairi Steele. Ruairi made tremendous progress in his school swimming lessons to become one of the best swimmers in Carnacaville. He represented St. Joseph’s Primary School at tennis and in the Newcastle Tennis Tournament, he progressed as far as the semi-finals with his partner, Ruairi Canavan. Where Ruairi impressed most and where he made the greatest advances in his skill level was on the basketball court. He has developed great special awareness with slick hand to eye coordination allied with good decision making and a deadly burst of speed. During his break and dinner times at school, he sacrificed his own free time to coach the other Primary 7 members of the school’s Adventure Club in perfecting their ‘figure of eight’ and safety knots in preparation for their climbing exploits with the NI Mountain Centre at Tollymore. During the year, Ruairi joined the Hot Rock Junior Climbing Club and this spider loves nothing more than hanging out on the wall on a Friday night. While Ruairi may be a quiet lad by nature, he is a hell-raiser on the local mountain bike trails and scrambling tracks. No doubt, he is influenced by his father David and his uncle Brian in these sports. Ruairi is a very worthy recipient of this year’s award for his all-round sporting endeavour. He may not be weighed down by trophies and medals but he loves his sports and has made marvellous advances this year and surely that’s what it is all about!
