Longford athletes reach new heights at the National Indoor Athletics Championships

It was a successful two days for local athletes at the concluding weekend of the National Juvenile Indoor Championships in Athlone. Both Longford Athletics Club and Lough Ree Athletics Club achieved podium places in a range of events.

A super Saturday last saw a trio of gold medals won by Longford athletes beginning with Conor Brennan taking the win in the Under 14 1000m Walk. Moyne CS student Conor maintained good technique throughout leading to a 32-second improvement in his personal best for the distance and a clear winning margin at the end of the five laps.

Having achieved Gold two weeks previously in the U-12 High Jump, Andrew Fitzpatrick again took the top spot on the podium following a convincing victory in the 2-kilogram Shot Put. A best effort of 10.41 metres was over 1.5m clear of the second-placed athlete.

Andrew’s brother John soon followed with a gold medal of his own when he won the U-14 High Jump. A best clearing height of 1.50m earned John indoor gold at the event for the third year in a row. He followed this up on Sunday with a silver medal won in the Long Jump following a leap of 4.80m. John narrowly missed out on a third medal of the weekend when placing fifth in the 60m Hurdles final with his chances greatly affected by clipping the penultimate hurdle.

Longford’s medal tally on Saturday continued in the U-17 1500m Walk with Robin Óg Murphy winning a silver medal. A disciplined race by Robin Óg who maintained her form throughout for a well-deserved place on the podium. El’Nathan Okoh brought home bronze after a good showing in the U-13 Long Jump, one of the most closely contested of events, with third place secured after a best effort of 4.38m.

There were many other good performances, with plenty of personal bests recorded, from Longford AC members over the weekend by Emily Oge Nnachi, Emma Brennan, Leah Waters, Seán Grealy, Oisín Dillon, Marc Galligan and Dylan Ledwith. It was once again a National Championships of a high standard of athletics.

Lough Ree Athletics Club enjoyed medal success on Sunday afternoon when Andrew Nolan achieved a silver medal after a best throw of 13.74m for the 2kg Shot Put. A distance that would have won the age group in most years, the gold medal this time went to Lavr Malejevs of Dooneen AC with a massive 14.33m. An excellent achievement for Clondra NS pupil Andrew who had Fabian Walsh proudly watching on from track side with Fabian a driving force of Lough Ree AC for many years.