Daily Irish Mail
9 May 2012
By Leah McDonald
In her demanding job as co-anchor of RTE’s Sunday Sports, Jacqui Hurley often has to go that extra mile.
Butn ow the 28 year old broadcaster is gearing up to run a mile in memory of her late brother – and then walk an extra aisle.
Jacqui, a top class basketball and camogie player, will run a leg in the Cork City marathon on June 4 – the latest task in the bucket list she has vowed to complete for her brother Sean, who died in a car accident aged 25 last November.
But that’s also the weekend she ties the knot with her fiancé, Shane McMahon.
The ceremony is on the Saturday but there will be little time to bask in her new status before she has to pound the roads on the Bank Holiday Monday.
She said: “I was hoping that all our family and friends could run the marathon in Sean’s memory so that he wouldn’t’ be forgotten at the wedding.
“The plan was to enter a team of 26 people who would each run a mile. But we have been inundated with people saying they would join us. We’ve got 52 people signed up so far.”
Jacqui, from Ballinhassig, Co Cork and her family are steadily working the list of ambitions that Sean made just two days before his death.
And in the process, they are raising money for CRY, the sudden cardiac death charity for which she is an ambassador.
“We’ve been inundated with people”
SEAN’S BUCKET LIST …… THE PROGRESS SO FAR
- Set up a riding school
In progress
- Be a Grand Prix rider
In progress
- World superbike winner
Irish racer Eugene Laverty has agreed that if he wins a race this season, he will wear a Bucket List T-shirt.
- Open a shop
In progress
- Run a pub
The Hurley family’s friends, the Colemans, have agreed to let them run their pub, The Sportsman’s Rest in Ballinhassig, for a day. This is likely to happen around Sean’s birthday in August.
- Own a racetrack – done!
Jacqui’s aunt Eileen hand-made a racetrack for Sean’s and has placed it at the accident site for people to stop off and see.
- Fitness trainer – done!
Sean’s girlfriend Sinead is training to become a fitness trainer. Sean had signed up to do the course this year but obviously hadn’t paid for it yet. Carrigaline Court Hotel, where he was due to train, kindly donated a place on the course for one of the team to take up, free of charge. It’s a six month course which Sinead started last month so, hopefully by the end of the year she’ll be fully qualified.
- Drive a digger – done!
While doing up their house, Jacqui’s mother and father hired a digger for a few days and everyone had a go.
- Work with concrete – done!
Also while doing up the house, Jacqui’s dad decided to concrete over a pothole on the bottom of the driveway – mostly to fulfill Sean’s ambition though he had been meaning to do it for a while.
- Run a marathon
Will be completed on Monday June 4 at the cork City Marathon. Jacqui is likely to be joined by around 60 to 70 people running a mile each.
- Do a triathlon – done!
Completed at the MonsterMac in Millstreet Country Parkon Saturday April 28. Thirty people took part in the event.
- Ride motorcross – done!
Completed on Saturday, April 7 at Ray Casey’s house in Cork. Ray is a friend of Sean who, when building his house decided to construct a motorcross track out the back. He invited the Hurleys out for a family raceday in April, an experience they said was ‘brilliant’.
- Do motor motorcross trials
Ray Casey is going to do this for Sean when he goes back riding this season.
- Get super fit
Training for the triathlon and marathon is helping Jacqui and her family and friends to achieve this.
- Be a millionaire!
Working on running a Who Wants to be a Millionaire night in Cork in November.