Irish Universities T&F 2023 (21st/22nd Apr)
Mullingar athletes in the medals at Irish Universities T&F
The Irish Universities T&F took place at the superb new Dundrum South Dublin AC track on Friday 21st and Saturday 22nd April, the first competition to be held at the new track in beautiful scenic surroundings in the foothills of the Dublin Mountains. Mullingar had five members competing for their Colleges, winning six medals between them.
Eoin Quinn (DCU) won his heat of the 800m with ease on Friday afternoon to qualify for Saturday’s final. The final went out fast from the gun, going through the bell in 51 seconds, with Eoin nicely positioned in fourth place, setting the race up for an exciting finish. Going down the back straight for the final time, Eoin kept working hard and finishing fast he had enough in reserve in the home straight to bring himself into third place and the bronze medal.
Contesting the extremely competitive 200m heats on Friday afternoon, Charles Okafor (DCU) finished fourth, unlucky to just miss a place in the final by only a few hundredths of a second. Charles returned to the track for the 4x100m relay on Saturday afternoon, running a terrific third leg and helping DCU to a runaway victory to win another Irish Universities gold medal and earn valuable team points for DCU.
Colin Smith (DCU) ran in the 1,500m heats on Friday afternoon finishing comfortably in fourth place to qualify automatically for Saturday’s final but didn’t feel one hundred present warming up, so wisely decided to sit the final out rather then risk injury so early in the season.
Moving to the 3,000m race walk, Mullingar had two members in action, Oisin Lane (UL) and Matthew Glennon (DCU). Oisin took the pace out fast right from the start, quickly pulling away and only had Matthew for company for some time. Both pushed on and were simply too strong for the opposition, but Oisin had the edge and slowly pulled clear to dominate the race and with a faultless display in this difficult technical event won well in a new UL record of 11:49:46, followed home by Matthew in second also having a great race.
The day ended with the 4x400m relay where Charles Okafor stepped up a distance to run the first leg for DCU and Eoin Quinn dropped down to run the second leg. Charles ran a fine race over the unfamiliar distance to hand over in second place by only a tiny margin. Eoin dropped back to third place on the back straight but made his move on the second bend to close on the leaders before unleashing his customary fast finish in the home straight to retake the lead for DCU, and the team went on to win easily.
In the team competition, DCU finished first and UL second, assisted by the points won by the Mullingar Harriers athletes competing for their Colleges.
