John Fitzpatrick jumped to a superb silver medal on Sunday at the National Indoors. In a very close U14 Long Jump competition, seven centimetres separated the top three at the end with John’s second last effort of 4.80m enough to secure silver.
The afternoon session then saw John take to the start line for the 60m Hurdles winning his heat with a new personal best of 9.77 seconds. He got out very well in the final before clipping the fourth hurdle which put him off stride. A desperately unlucky moment for John who went on the cross the line in fifth. So close to a third medal of the weekend, John has had another brilliant indoor season showing again what a talented young athlete he is.
Oisín Dillon set a new PB of 2:11 to qualify from his heat of the U15 800m. He produced another strong showing in the final for a sixth-place finish in what was a top-quality race and Oisín has made excellent progress in the event this season.
Following the 60m on Saturday, Seán Grealy was back on the track for the U17 200m heats and set another quick time. Unfortunately, his 23.77 seconds was just 0.01 off securing a place in the final but it was Seán’s second PB of the weekend to show he’s in good form ahead of outdoors.
Emma Brennan was also back in Athlone for her U17 800m. In what was a high-quality heat, Emma ran strongly to place sixth in the end. Leah Waters put in a good series of jumps in the U14 Long Jump with a best effort of 4.16m improving on her distance set at the Connachts.
Making his first appearance at a National Indoors, Dylan Ledwith ran well in the U17 800m and improved on his Connachts time by two seconds. Marc Galligan was also making his first All-Ireland indoors appearance showing good technique in the U16 60m Hurdles in setting a new PB for the event.
Well done to all and many thanks to our club coaches for their time and commitment over the indoor season. A lot of progress made ahead of outdoors.
The three days of Nationals in Athlone saw a high standard of athletics with Longford athletes performing very well and the club ranked eighth overall in the medals table. Our thanks to the event officials who make these competitions possible.
