Cookes strike gold in Community Games

AFTER a while, you start to associate certain teams and sports stars with certain arenas. Whether it’s the Kilkenny hurlers in Croke Park, Dermot Weld with the summer race meeting in Ballybrit or Michael Phelps on the gold medal podium at the Olympics, there are places and athletes that just seem to go hand in hand.
Given their track record of success over the past six summers, the Cooke family from Caherlistrane will soon become known for their association with the swimming pool at the National Community Games finals in that very same way.
Few families have left their mark on the Community Games festival in anything like the same way as the Cookes have done in recent years and the trend continued again a little over a week ago in Athlone when they added two more gold medals to their burgeoning collection.
Uiseann, Olwyn and Aonghus — all named after characters in Irish folklore tales – continued to build on their family’s formidable reputation when they picked up more prizes this year but parents John and Finola insist that the essence of the Community Games is about participation, and that it was in that spirit that their own little tribe developed a love of competitive swimming.