To all of us who know Rita Parsons, Treasurer of Railway Union Sports Club on Park Avenue in Sandymount, we can never have felt less than impressed by her enormous enthusiasm for sport.

Since school days at Holy Faith Convent Secondary School in Haddington Road, Rita has been seriously involved in tennis, hockey and cricket. She has been with Railway Union since 1976, and captained two very successful second elevens in hockey and won the Irish Cup on two occasions.

Under the stewardship of Rita Parsons and her work on the Executive Committee, the club has expanded, she has been involved with its improvements and enlargement and was most gratified when the new changing rooms were completed in 1998. No one can estimate the amount of voluntary work she has invested in bar management, as well as managing the financial matters of the club.

In 1989 she was elected Honorary Life Member of Railway Union Sports Club by the Executive Committee Ten years later she is still doing Trojan work, but the club has at last appointed a permanent bar manager, so that at least now there is more time for the Treasurer to attend to the ever-pressing demands made on her.

Treasurer of Irish Ladies Hockey Union for the entire country, she nevertheless finds personal time to play tennis, her second love.

Talking to her, one senses the drive that impels her to look after the club, knowing every fixture and happening down to the smallest detail

Out of the wads of photographs we have seen which include Rita Parsons in some winning event or other, she picked out a favourite, taken in Northern Ireland, shown above.

The privilege is all ours to be able to give a tiny section of the profile of a very distinguished sportswoman, whose prime concern is the promotion of sport so that it has an appeal, for young enthusiasts coming up and hoping they will persist with whichever sport is their chosen game.

Shown in the photograph from left to right at the Sports Council of Ireland: Treasurer of Irish Ladies’ Hockey, Rita Parsons, President of Leinster Ladies’ Hockey, Grace Reid Ulster Sec, Nonna Gartside Irish Ladies Hockey Sec. Joan Mc Clory.

Looking for a way of getting around the congested streets of our city this Christmas time which doesn’t involve sitting in a traffic jam for two long hours?

Well, how about hopping onto your old bicycle and peddling your way freely through the grid-lock of hooting cars and swearing motorists. You may say that you’d love to do this, but you don’t even have a bicycle. But you probably do.

Chances are that there is an old Raleigh out there in the shed, gathering dust behind the deckchairs, or an old black machine with no brand name down the bottom of the garden collecting rust.

So how about pulling them out and climbing on? And even if you really don’t have any sort of a bike, to buy a new one these days is not expensive. There is now a huge range of light-weight mountain bikes on the market which are perfect for getting around on and which don’t cost a fortune to buy, especially in comparison to the price of running a car at the moment.

And, of course, the bike wins out over the car in many other ways too. It is silent, clean, friendly to the environment and requires no insurance or taxation. Don’t forget Ringsend Cycles beside Ringsend Library, or Freeman Cycles at the top of Bath Ave for new purchases and repairs. Tell them we sent you.