Taking full advantage of the beautiful warm day on Sunday 19th April and suitably refreshed after the Easter break, a small group of our juvenile athletes made the trip to Co. Kildare for the Crookstown-Millview AC Annual Open Sports. Sports like this provide ideal low-key early season competition in relaxed surroundings and let everyone try different events and get used to track competition away from the pressure of a Championship.

Nicole Gorry, Meabh McNulty, Faye Walsh and Aine O’Reilly took the opportunity to double up with a sprint and a middle distance race and were well rewarded for their efforts. Nicole and Meabh qualified easily for the final of the 100m u/11 where Nicole finished second and Meabh was unlucky to finish out of the medals but in the 300m later on, Meabh turned the tables and finished strongly to take bronze, with Nicole finishing close behind but just out of the medals. Nicole and Meabh even tried the ball throw and though they didn’t win a medal, enjoyed taking part anyway. Faye Walsh finished out of the medals in her 100m u/13 but stormed through the field with a terrific sprint in the closing stages of the 600m later on to take silver in a very close finish. Double honours to Aine O’Reilly who took bronze in the 100m u/16 and used her sprinting pace with an excellent kick with 200m to go in the 800m to take a well deserved silver medal.

Our youngest sprinter Aoife Darby won silver in the 100m u/9, Rachel Yorke won silver in the 800m u/18, and Stephen Nea won bronze in the 800m u/16.

There was disappointment for Conor Boyle and Jordan Wyse as they got lost getting to the track and arrived just in time for the start of 600m u/13 where they ran well but without a proper warm-up it was no surprise that they struggled to find their best form and finished out of the medals.

Other than that glitch, it was medals for everyone else from Mullingar that took part and this will give them a great early season confidence boost. No doubt Conor and Jordan will wish to make amends next time and get among the medals too.

Many thanks to the Gorry, McNulty, O’Reilly, Yorke, Darby and Boyle families for providing transport and giving the young athletes an opportunity to compete.