AAI National Senior T&F Championships 2022 (25th/26th June)
The 150th consecutive AAI National Senior T&F Championships continued an illustrious history as the 2022 edition was held in Santry on Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th June. The first national athletics championships were organised in Trinity College Dublin in 1873 and the Championships have been held every year since then, despite two World Wars, the War of Independence, the Civil War, and two Global pandemics (Spanish Flu and Covid-19), making the Irish national championships the longest running consecutive national senior championships in the world. To mark the occasion, every athletics club in Ireland was invited to send an Ambassador to Santry on Sunday afternoon, and wearing their club colours, to run 150m. The Mullingar Harriers Ambassador was Lauryn Smith, one of our youngest members, and she was delighted to be part of the occasion and after her 150m run she was presented with a commemorative 150th Anniversary tee shirt. Well done to Lauryn on being such an excellent Ambassador for Mullingar Harriers!
All the Mullingar athletes competed on Sunday, in cool and windy and at times absolutely soaking wet conditions. First into action in the 10,000m race walk was Oisin Lane and Matthew Glennon. Oisin had planned to help Matthew to the World Junior standard and was on track at 5k but the conditions just weren’t in their favour and unfortunately that plan had to be abandoned. Oisin went on to finish an excellent fourth place behind three World class race walkers, in a time just outside his personal best with Matthew finishing a very creditable seventh in his first National Senior outdoor final.
Charles Okafor lined up in the fourth of seven heats of the 100m where he finished fourth in a time that would have won some of the other heats or placed second in most. Though it was fourth, it was still quick enough to qualify for the semi-finals. Conditions deteriorated and were simply awful for the semi-finals, and running in the third of three semis, Charles placed fourth again into a ferocious headwind of 5.1m/s, but his time wasn’t quick enough to advance to the fiercely competitive final, but top marks for effort.
There were three races over 5,000m and in the B Race, Jack Moran and Vinny Connolly competed for Mullingar. There was an early breakaway by four athletes, leaving Vinny and Jack to lead the chasing group. With just over five laps to go, Jack put in a significant injection of pace to close the gap on the leaders and quickly moved into second place. He continued to work hard to close the gap on the leader but the effort took its toll and Jack was closed down and caught in the closing stages to finish fifth in 15:02.74, just outside his personal best, with Vinny finishing fast in eighth place in 15:12.79, a new personal best by 20 seconds. Jack O’Leary and Jamie Battle ran in the A Race, which was run at a fast pace from the outset with Jack keeping in contention and Jamie not far off the pace. However, as the race progressed and the pace increased, Jack and Jamie had to ease back and though both finished strong, Jack well up in the large field, with Jamie behind, it wasn’t to be their day.
