On Saturday August 12th in the Regional Sports
Centre in Waterford four athletics teams comprising 320 athletes from
Ireland,Ulster, Wales and Scotland celebrated 30 years of the Celtic
Games International.
These top young athletes represented their four countries and competed
in 41 Track events and 26 Field events. Over the years the Celtic
International has been the first stepping stone for many of our young
athletes to International Competition.
Tallaght Athletic Club had two athletes selected to represent their club
and country in this prestigious competition and they certainly produced
the goods with performances of the highest calibre.
Brian Gregan was first into the fray at mid-day when he lined up in the
400M and despite being put under immense pressure in the home straight
by the Welsh competitor Brian fought bravely into the wind all the way
to the line to take Gold for Ireland in a fine time of 50.2 . In the
last event of the day Brian also anchored the 4x400M to finish in 2nd
place behind a talented Scottish squad.
Robert Fitzsimons had a long wait before he
lined up in the 2K Steeplechase at 5pm. The race proved to be a tactical
affair with a modestly paced first lap with Fitzsimons poised patiently
at the back of the pack. After lap 2 things began to heat up with the
lead exchanging several times but in Lap 4 Fitzsimons raced to the front
and opened up a gap which he extended to run out a comfortable winner in
a very respectable time of 6.25 which won Robert a Championship Best
performance award.
These performances augur well for these two
talented and dedicated athletes and they can be proud of their
contribution which saw Ireland finish in 2nd place overall behind
Scotland in the team scores.