It was an action-packed evening in Athlone IT Sport Arena last night where a host of Irish and International athletes battled it out on the indoor track to chase precious Olympic points, indoor records and early season personal bests.
There were some terrific displays of power and strength from the Irish athletes with one of the highlights, the new Irish 200m indoor record for Cork’s Phil Healy in a time of 23.10 seconds. The result broke a record that has stood since 2003 when Ciara Sheehy ran 23.17.
This is Healy’s third Irish sprint record at home in the past eighteen months and was the fastest run by a European Athlete this season, setting her up for a super season ahead.
Personal Bests
Ciara Mageean was in flying form on the track as she tackled the 3,000m distance crossing the line in 8’48.28 winning the race and setting a new PB in a distance. That was five and a half seconds off the mark set by Mary Cullen in 2009 and takes Mageean to number three on the Irish all-time list indoors.
In a nailbiting final lap of the track, Barr put it all on the line in the 400m to be first past the post against European Indoor bronze medallist Tony Van Diepen of the Netherlands who took victory on the night and second-placed Pavel Maslak, the three time world Indoor Champion, who did not give an inch in chasing the podium
Barr was just edged into third position finishing in a time of 46.44 seconds this was .3 of a second faster than his previous best on the flat and was delighted to deliver a personal best in his first race of the season.
Indoor Mile World Record Attempt
The indoor mile world record attempt was a definite highlight of the night where Ethiopia’s Samuel Tefera chased the record but fell short by just short by 8 seconds finishing in 3’55.9. In an exciting final two laps of the track it was Ireland’s Brian Fay who had the audience going wild, picking up the pace on the second last lap he raced his heart out to move into second place and bridge the gap to Tefera, he finished in a strong second in 4:00.77, narrowly missing out on becoming the 22nd Irishman to break the four-minute barrier indoors.
The event hosted by Athlone IT was well attended and the atmosphere was electric from early evening with the young athletes in the 4*200m relays warming up the crowd with their fine displays on the track. We are already looking forward to the 2021 edition of this event.
