2009 European Cross Country Championships
Rank Athlete Country Time ( m : s )
1 Hayley Yelling United Kingdom 27:49
2 Rosa María Morató Spain 27:56
3 Adriënne Herzog Netherlands 28:04
4 Jessica Augusto Portugal 28:11
5 Inês Monteiro Portugal 28:14
6 Ana Dulce Félix Portugal 28:19
7 Olivera Jevtic Serbia 28:21
8 Tetyana Holovchenko Ukraine 28:25
9 Freya Murray United Kingdom 28:25
10 Sara Moreira Portugal 28:32
11 Fionnuala Britton Ireland 28:39
12 Mary Cullen Ireland 28:45
Race results -- Women 's senior
Adriënne Herzog of the Netherlands took the bronze in the senior women 's competition .
The 2009 European Cross Country Championships was a continental cross country running competition that was held on 13 December 2009 near Dublin city, Fingal in Ireland. Dublin was selected as the host city in 2007 and the event was the first time that a major European athletics championships took place in Ireland. The six men's and women's races in the championship programme took place in Santry Demense on a looped course with flat and grassy ground. The 16th edition of the European Cross Country Championships featured 323 athletes from 30 nations. Alemayehu Bezabeh upset the defending champion (Serhiy Lebid) to win the men's senior race: it was his first medal at a major international competition and he was the first Spanish runner to win in the history of the championships. In the women's senior competition, Hayley Yelling was a surprise winner, having come out of her competitive retirement just weeks before the race. The much favoured Portuguese team (which included Jessica Augusto and Inês Monteiro) did not reach the individual podium but they took the gold in the team competition. Noureddine Smaïl and Hassan Chahdi took gold and silver in the men's under-23 competition, leading the French to a team victory. Jeroen D'Hoedt was the winner of the men's junior race. Sultan Haydar won the women's under-23 race while Karoline Bjerkeli Grøvdal added to her junior honours with a gold in the women's junior race, becoming the first Norwegian gold medallist of the championships' history. Almost 7000 spectators attended the championships and, in Europe, it was broadcast live on television for free by RTÉ, the Irish state broadcaster.