Mary McAleese<\/a> and her husband Martin were among the guests at the informal gathering, where the very dainty canap\u00e9s were apparently prepared with a flavoursome nod to the ambassador\u2019s previous diplomatic postings. <\/p>\nMary is really looking forward to Tuesday\u2019s inauguration, even though she\u2019s already been through two of her own and then two more for Michael D. <\/p>\n
Has she got her outfit sorted?<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m wearing the one I wore to the last inauguration. Sure why not to take it out again?\u201d<\/p>\n
She was wearing a very nice dress at the ambassador\u2019s reception.<\/p>\n
\u201cI made it myself,\u201d she said proudly. <\/p>\n
Unusually, the event was something of a politician-free zone. We noticed Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s Rose Conway-Walsh (who once worked behind the bar in the UK House of Lords). It was left to the Ceann Comhairle to fly the flag for D\u00e1il \u00c9ireann. <\/p>\n
And Attorney General Rossa Fanning flew the flag for Government buildings. <\/p>\n
Ambassador Owen talked about her determination to improve her fluency in Irish, to great encouragement from the crowd. <\/p>\n
We blame the incoming president for this sudden fixation with our native tongue among the chattering classes. <\/p>\n
Not only is His Majesty\u2019s representative putting some of us to shame with her proficiency, but both the Australian ambassador Chantelle Taylor and Lynn Walsh, wife of US ambassador Ed Walsh, told us they are trying to learn some of the language too. <\/p>\n
Also among the guests was the Defence Forces chief of staff, Lieut Gen Rossa Mulcahy. <\/p>\n
He was shooting the breeze with the ambassador\u2019s husband, William Tierney, a retired Irish army officer from Ballinasloe in Co Galway. The couple met when they were working in Indonesia. <\/p>\n
In the running<\/p>\n
If politics is a marathon and not a sprint, then Rory Hearne of the Social Democrats is the fastest TD in Leinster House. <\/p>\n
The Dublin North West deputy ran the recent Dublin marathon in just under three hours, blowing his political rivals out of the water. As well as posting a personal best of two hours and 55 minutes, the Soc Dems spokesman on housing also raised funds for Focus Ireland as he ran around the houses. <\/p>\n
It meant he had to hold back on celebrating Catherine Connolly\u2019s Saturday night presidential victory with the rest of his jubilant party colleagues as he was due at the starting line for his 10th Dublin marathon the next morning. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a very wet and cold day, but the atmosphere was just amazing. Dublin is always an incredible marathon, the crowd gives the runners such incredible support.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Social](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/5U7ZZUAAQBHJPNWBYHWJQKUXRE.jpg\")
Social Democrats TD Rory Hearne finishing the Dublin marathon <\/p>\n
Fianna F\u00e1il\u2019s marathon man Malcolm Byrne notched up his 39th marathon \u2013 18 of them in the capital. <\/p>\n
Given his party\u2019s performance in the presidential election, the TD for Wicklow-Wexford will have had much to think about as he pounded the roads around Dublin city after his party\u2019s campaign limped to a merciful close. <\/p>\n
It was tough going for the runners due to the difficult weather conditions. \u201cThe crowds along the way were just incredible. We got great support on the route \u2013 and it got me around.\u201d<\/p>\n
During the fraught fallout from Fianna F\u00e1il\u2019s disastrous campaign, one unnamed Minister described Malcolm as more of a \u201cloose horse\u201d than one of the anti-Miche\u00e1l Martin rebels. Fortunately, he managed not to crash in to any other runners during his 4\u00bd-hour \u201cpotter\u201d around the route. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m more of a workhorse than a show pony,\u201d he said afterwards.<\/p>\n
Wonder if he saw the sign held up by one man in the crowd shouting encouragement to the passing runners. <\/p>\n
\u201cUnlike Jim Gavin, you\u2019ll finish this race!\u201d<\/p>\n
And if Sinn F\u00e9in had an excellent presidential election, the party had a great Dublin marathon too.<\/p>\n
Three TDs ran the marathon on the morning after the night the candidate they supported became president-elect. <\/p>\n
It was no surprise to hear that Wicklow\u2019s John Brady completed the course. This was his 15th marathon. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t get any easier, each one is as hard as the previous one,\u201d he said, after clocking up a time of three hours and 34 minutes. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe crowds were just phenomenal \u2013 it was a special atmosphere. They carry you from the start the full way up to the finish line.\u201d <\/p>\n
He was also very proud of his D\u00e1il colleagues Ruair\u00ed \u00d3 Murch\u00fa (Louth) and Paul Donnelly (Dublin West) who successfully completed their marathons on the day.<\/p>\n
Did he have any advice for the newbies?<\/p>\n
\u201cJust put the head down and keep one foot in front of the other.\u201d<\/p>\n
Is Sinn F\u00e9in now Ireland\u2019s fittest parliamentary party?<\/p>\n
Labour didn\u2019t have an Oireachtas member in the race. \u201cThey were all out celebrating Catherine Connolly\u2019s win,\u201d said a spokesman. <\/p>\n
Fine Gael didn\u2019t have one either. <\/p>\n
But the party pointed to Monaghan county councillor Aidan Campbell, a member of Blayney Rockets AC, who has run every Dublin marathon since 1994.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The president-elect was in Leinster House again this week but she managed to stay below the radar during…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[3656,21312,61,60,5785,31650,43,27999,3341],"class_list":["post-128547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-catherine-connolly","tag-david-beckham","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mary-mcaleese","tag-miriam-lord","tag-news","tag-verona-murphy","tag-victoria-beckham"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"British](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/DN7G6RS4JRCCVFAHTSBKFBVV2I.jpg\")
British ambassador to Ireland Kara Owen at the British Embassy in Dublin. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n