The Donegal Childrens Games will be held at the Finn Valley Centre, Stranorlar on Friday 22^nd May at 6.30pm.  These games will be for children born between 1997 and 2001 and will be an excellent opportunity for our young athletes to put the skills and training learned over the past number of months into practice against other young children from across the county.

The following day, Saturday 23^rd May, the Donegal Juvenile, Senior and Masters Championships will be held at the Danny McDaid track, Letterkenny, starting time 12pm.  These championships will be for older children born prior to 1997.

The club encourages all our athletes to attend and compete in these Championships.  Club coaches have been impressed with the numbers at training, and the enthusiasm, development and willingness to learn of our athletes over the course of the last few months.  These Championships will also be an opportunity for parents to come along and see for themselves the strides their children have been making with the club.  We would encourage full attendance at training in the coming days and weeks, as once the Donegal Championships have finished, our attention will quickly turn to the Ulster Championships in June.

At this stage, all our athletes should be registered with the club, and we must insist on everyone being registered prior to competition.  The club has no problem with stage payments being made, as long as these have started prior to competition.  The last thing any club coach wishes to do is to refuse a child attendance at training or an event.

Over the past number of weeks, club coaches have been carrying out athletics development work with school children in Lifford, Murlog and in two schools in Raphoe.  This work will extend into schools in the St. Johnston area this week.  What is evident from this work has been the raw athletic talent in young children, with many never availing of an opportunity to develop this within a club setting.  The work in the Lifford area alone has reaped dividends, with many new children now attending training.  The club hopes the current work in Raphoe and St. Johnston will also be fruitful for the club, and while the distance to the club may be problematic for some parents, the links now developed can be built upon over the coming weeks and months.

Finally, the club will make an announcement shortly as to the development of its tartan track.  With no Sports Capital Grants being made available this year, it is now apparent that the non allocation of funding to the Lifford area in 2008 was a missed opportunity for all.  Given the likelihood of no such grants for the foreseeable future, club officials have been quietly exhausting every avenue in their attempt to secure funding for the tracks completion.  The club is now at a crossroads in terms of either finishing the track at huge expense, doing nothing and waiting until grants become available, or digging up over a quarter of million euros worth of work to replace the track with cinders.  With these dilemmas now being faced, a decision will have to take place either way in the coming days.