Superb Success for Longford athletes at the National Juvenile Championships

John Fitzpatrick scaled new heights when leaping a brilliant 1.58 metres to win the Under-13 High Jump with his gold-medal winning effort a full eighteen centimetres ahead of the silver medallist. This followed earlier success when achieving an excellent bronze medal placing in the Shot Put.

John’s day wasn’t over as Long Jump success followed with a longest effort of 4.61 metres in a closely contested event. An extremely impressive feat given that John only took up the long jump in recent months. A return of two golds and a bronze a fantastic return on another great day of competition for the multi-talented John.

Further success in the field event came with Andrew Nolan, of Lough Ree Athletics Club, securing gold with a very impressive display in the Under-12 Shot Put following a best effort of 12.05 metres. This championship record followed up indoors success by Andrew earlier in the year in Athlone.

Another of the day’s top performances in Tullamore came when the talented Longford AC Under-12 boys 4 x 100 metres relay team of Dillon Walsh, El'Nathan Okoh, Andrew Fitzpatrick and Adam Mulleady set a blistering time of 56.43 seconds in an outstanding team display to convincingly win gold. The feat also marked a double as indoor Under 12 relay success had come back in March. 

Saturday morning’s action saw fantastic gold successes in the Under-10 pairs. In the 60 metres event, Joe Rooney and Jairo Aklassou combined to set the fastest time overall. The boys’ combined time of 19.72 seconds was 0.01 seconds ahead of second place North Cork AC. 

Jairo followed sprints success when teaming up Zac Nolan for an impressive victory in the Turbo Javelin. Excellent throwing by the pair resulted with a combined distance of over 41 metres to take the title with Jairo’s 25-metre the furthest effort individually in the age group.

More medals followed with silver for Andrew Fitzpatrick and Charlie Nolan in the Under-11 Turbo Javelin pairs. The second longest combined distance secured a spot on the podium for the duo with Andrew setting the best overall individual throw with 27.38 metres.

In the Under-9 age events; Ashlee Brady, Emily Weafer, Maia Belton and Caitlin Eager all competed very well across a range of events. Sarah Connolly, Leah Waters, Sophia Smith and Zoe Mulligan each competed strongly in the Under-13 age events including an excellent fifth place in the 4 x 100m relay.