By Rory Cassidy

Last weekend the Athletics Ireland hosted their Micro Elite Event at the National Indoor Arena in Abbottstown, Dublin. The event marked the return of competitive athletics on Irish soil after Covid-19 disrupted the planned Cross-Country season back in October.

All eyes were on just how successful the event would be and crucially, as we are in a Level 5 lockdown, how safe it would be. Athletics Ireland sought approval from Sport Ireland to host the event and were granted permission to do so. Only a handful of elite athletes who were targeting qualification for the European Indoor Championships and tracking ranking points for the Tokyo Olympics competed. Numbers in races were small with a couple of events having one athlete only.

The action failed to disappoint. Irish middle-distance running is looking very healthy at the moment. Both the Men’s and Women’s 800m events highlighted that. UK born athlete Georgie Hartigan (now representing Ireland) won the Women’s race in 2.01.48 knocking three seconds off her personal best in the process. Louise Shanahan and Iseult O’Donnell also both went under the 2.03 barrier making it the fastest race on domestic soil in quiet some time. DCU’s own Nadia Power had broken the Irish Indoor record over the distance at the World Indoor Tour meet in Torun, Poland just a couple of days earlier, in a time of 2.00.98 and as a result was absent from the field as she prepares for the upcoming European Indoors. Nadia’s record didn’t last long as on Sunday night in America, Siofraigh Cleirigh-Buttner knocked a further 0.40s off it, clocking a phenomenal 2.00.58.

In the Men’s 800m race, Mark English broke the National Record, running 1.46.10, just ahead of Longford teenager Cian McPhilips who broke the U20 and U23 record in a time of 1.46.13. John Fitzsimons also achieved the European standard finishing in 1.47.80.

Leon Reid, a previous finalist at the European Outdoor Championships won both the 60m and 200m races, clocking PB’s in both and qualifying for Europeans. He will be joined in the 60m’s by Israel Olatunde who broke the U20 and U23 National Record with his performance. Molly Scott also achieved the standard in the Women’s 60m event.

DCU sports scholarship athlete Sophie Becker will also be on the plane to Poland in ten days’ time after achieving the standard in the 400m’s. The race was won by Phil Healy who is closing in on the Irish record after running an extraordinary 51.99s. They will be joined by Sharlene Mawdsley. Three athletes in the race and three qualifying standards speaks for itself.

Luke McCann will join already qualified DCU sports scholarship athlete Andrew Corscoran on the team. McCann ran another new PB on Sunday of 3.40.03 in the 1500m.

No fewer than four athletes went under the qualifying standard in the Men’s 3000m, John Travers, Darragh McElhinney (New U23 National Record), Conor Bradley and Hiko Tonosa. Travers and McElhinney both make the 24-person team who will be in action in Torun, Poland between the 5 th and 7 th of March. This will be the largest ever team Ireland has sent to these championships highlighting the incredible strength and depth across events at the moment.

Above all for me this highlights that other minority sports need to look at holding elite only events as soon as possible. For our athletes to fulfil their potential in competition including in the Olympics this summer they need to be competition ready. Athletics Ireland showed fantastic initiative and ran a very successful weekend of competition. Currently no spectators are allowed so the action was live streamed with commentary on YouTube allowing people to tune in and potentially drawing new people into the sport.

The event was Covid-19 compliant with long intervals between events to keep numbers present to a minimum at all times and athletes and officials alike had to have a negative Covid-19 test before entering the arena along with filling out countless forms on a daily basis before the event in relation to symptoms.

Other sports such as Swimming and Boxing should in my opinion look to take a leaf out of Athletics Ireland’s book before it is too late. Normally at this point in an Olympic cycle athletes would have had plenty of competitions and meets in the year prior to the games but due to the pandemic this is not the case.

If we are to increase our medal tally of just two in Rio in 2016 to between four and eight in Tokyo, governing bodies, in my opinion, need to work with Sport Ireland and the government to see what can be facilitated to allow elite athletes to compete in a safe manner. If Athletics Ireland can do it, others can too!

It should be noted that while governing bodies are focusing on elites, they need to look at the possibility of equal access to facilities for everyone at the earliest opportunity but particularly for kids, so the next generation of Olympians aren’t left behind.