Tallaght Juvenile Athletes Top Championship Podium

Tallaght A.C. juveniles topped the podium on no less than six occasions at the Dublin Juvenile Athletic Championships at Santry over the last two weekends.

The first Championship title was claimed by Nadine Johnston Hickey after she stormed to victory in her inaugural championship outing in the U10 500m contest, whilst Evan Flynn, the dual 2008 U12 and U13 Dublin cross country champion showed his versatility when he did likewise in the U13 600m contest.

Eoin Doherty added a third title for the club in the U13 60m sprint and his brother Keith took the U15 equivalent and later went on to take the long jump title. In the U15 high jump, Jonathan Fleet, only back in training after an absence of 18 months, blew off the cobwebs to beat the 2008 National Champion after a nail biting finale, which saw both clear the same heights after all other competitors had been eliminated and it was only after both had failed to clear 1.60m, that Jonathan was declared the winner on count back.

More medals were added across a range of events at different age levels with young athletes like Conor Murray just missing out on a number of titles after taking silver in the U13 60m, 800m, and high jump and bronze in the 60m hurdles. Similarly Christopher duffy went very close in his first championship outing when he took silver in the U10 500m and both Eoin and Keith Doherty went very close to adding to their gold medals after taking silver in the U13 long jump and U15 60m hurdles respectively.

At U18 degree Niall Meehan won silver in the 1500m and Ciaran Mackey did likewise in both the U19 60m and 400m and he went close to taking a third medal when finishing 4th in the 200m. John Daly and Sean Mc Cabe added to the individual medal haul with two bronze each in the U15 60, 60m hurdles and long jump and high jump finals respectively and Jonathan Fleet added 60m hurdles bronze to his gold medal in the high jump, whilst Roisin O’ Hanlon took the bronze in the U18 1500m.

Additional medals were secured in the relay events with the U10 4X100m team of Elliott Meehan, Karl Graham, Seamus Noone and James Ackerman taking silver and the U15 2008 Dublin champions and National silver medalists, Johns Daly, Keith Doherty, Sean Mc Cabe and Conor Murray combing in the 4x200m to take the title for Tallaght. The U11 girls 4X100m team, Rebecca Casey, Jennifer Graham, Nicole Fullam and Nadine Johnston Hickey went very close after they finished 4th.

Overall this was a great start to these Championships with the athletes taking 6 titles, 9 silver and 7 bronze in the individual contests along with 2 sets of relay medals and hopefully more to come over the next weekend at Santry, and later in Nenagh on 28th/29th March and Magherafelt Co Derry on 4th/5th April when the qualifiers from the U12’s to U19’s contest the National Finals.

Elsewhere Sean Connolly put in another superb performance when finishing second in the Ballycotton 10 mile road race. Throughout the contest Sean was always to the fore and constantly tagged the eventual race winner Vinny Mulvey, Raheny Shamrocks until the last few hundred meters when Mulvey pulled out a bit more to take his third title in this event in 49.06, just 5 seconds ahead of Sean. Sean followed this up with another superb run in the Dublin St Patricks Festival 5k road race on Sunday last where he finished 3rd overall in the large field of competitors.

Photos in Gallery