Olympiad
The Irish Women's Olympiad team members were Gearoidin Ui Laighleis, Elizabeth Shaunessy, Sarah Cormican, Anne Coughlan and Una OBoyle. The best performances came from Gearoidin (who came within one point of a WFM title on B1) and Una who both achieved WCM. Sarah managed very good performance of 4 out of 8. Una O'Boyle was also responsible for the very successful Irish night which was enjoyed by many nationalities. Coaching with Mark Quinn was held in Dublin for the Olympiad team before they left.
Juniors
The girls gave the boys a run for there money in the Junior championships, with Paula Eglite winning the U10 section and Sinead Duffy came third in the U12. Poormina Menon finished third in the under 19.
The Glasgow 2008 Jessie Gilbert cup team were Sarah-Jane Aherne, Sarah Cormican and Ruth Cormican. They had a tough time with losses against England and Scotland, but drew with Wales.
Women's Championsip
There is a continuing problem of how to run a womens championship. The 9 day Irish championships is only open to players over 1900 which excludes most female players, and the other women are spread very thinly through the lower sections, which are only 5 rounds for the weekends of the Irish championships. One option is to decide the women's champion at one of the Open tournaments, which at the moment is either Limerick or Ennis. The other option is to hold a separate women's championship.
Limerick Women's Chess
Many thanks to John Alfred for his done great work encouraging womens chess in Limerick. He has run women's and girls' rapid play competitions and is considering setting up a women's chess evenings. If anyone is interested they can reach him at .