Week ending Saturday 31st July
International Selection for Aisling Lane
The European under 18 T&F was scheduled to take place in Italy in August but was cancelled due to Covid. Anxious to fill the gap in International competition for this age group, Athletics Ireland has secured an invitation to send a team to an International under 18 T&F Match in Franconville (Paris), France this week-end. Because the event takes place before the National Juvenile T&F, which would usually be the trial for such an event, athletes were asked to submit expressions of interest with records of their personal best or season’s best times to Athletics Ireland, who would then select a team closely based on the standards used for the European under 18 T&F. Given her dominance in the under 17 age group, surpassing the times of the under 18 girls, and her performances this year over 3k race walk, Aisling Lane was named last Wednesday among a team of twenty three athletes to compete in France. This is a huge honour for Aisling, her family and Mullingar Harriers and it will mark her International debut. Congratulations to Aisling from everyone at Mullingar Harriers and we wish her every success in France.
More Mullingar Medals as Leinster T&F concludes
The Leinster T&F Championships concluded last Saturday in warm sunny conditions at IT Carlow with the final day of the under 14 to under 19 T&F. In the under 15 boys 800m, a recurrence of a hip injury shortly into the race put paid to Conor Liston’s chances and he didn’t advance to the final to join Jamie Wallace who qualified comfortably from his heat to take his place in the final as a medal favourite. The final was run at a fast pace from the gun, the leader going through the bell in 61 seconds, with Jamie on his shoulder, clear of the chasing pack. Jamie made his move with 150m to go, quickly passing the leader and looking good for gold, but into the home straight the athlete that had been in third place throughout put in a terrific sprint to pass Jamie and with no time to counterattack, Jamie crossed the line in second place, but in a terrific new personal best time of 2 minutes 8.81 seconds.
Caoimhe Donohue attacked from the start of the under 16 girls 800m and was rewarded with a new personal best of 2 minutes 31.50 seconds to finish well up but not enough to finish in the medal places. Jessica Cunningham finished very strongly behind her, followed home by Síofra O’Halloran, both competing strongly. In the corresponding under 16 boys 800m, Pablo Lozano was determined to qualify for his first Leinster track final and led the field for most of the race, dropping back to third with 200m to go but a late rally saw him finish second in 2 minutes 18.88 seconds, a new personal best, to qualify for the final. The heat of the day and the effort in qualifying took its toll though and despite a spirited performance in the final he finished out of the medal places but was still delighted to have achieved his goal of making a Leinster final.
Competing in the under 15 boys triple jump, his first time in the event, Criostoir Ormsby took a few jumps to settle in, including an unnerving three no jumps in a row, but finally got it right and in his final jump clinched the silver medal. Criostoir made it a double later in the day when he finished second in the under 15 boys 250m hurdles, again, a new event for him, but he made short work of the distance and the barriers and was delighted to win his second Leinster medal of the day.
Over all the days of the Championships, Mullingar athletes amassed a total of twenty medals – 10 gold, 7 silver and 3 bronze, which will see the maroon and white of Mullingar out in force at the All-Ireland finals in August.
AAI Summer Games
It was another hot and sunny day in IT Carlow last Sunday for the AAI Summer Games. Disappointed not to have qualified for the All-Ireland Juvenile T&F finals in August, Lorcan Mullen and Ross Killalea competed in the 1,500m aiming to end the track season on a good note. Running in the second race, they both competed with intent from the gun, keeping in close contact with the leasers and finished strongly, Lorcan in fourth in a new personal best time of 4 minutes 7.69 seconds, with Ross close behind in sixth in 4 minutes 9.84 seconds, also a new personal best, to round off their seasons in style.
By the time the 5,000m started, temperatures were very high and not at all conducive to distance running, but Ian McCormack and Andrew Nevin are made of stern stuff and battled on against the heat and humidity, finishing strongly in fourth and fifth respectively, only a few seconds separating them at the finish.
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