Sonia to miss world indoors

SONIA O’SULLIVAN is unlikely to compete in the world indoor championships in Birmingham next month.

While she has not ruled herself out, she made it clear yesterday that, at the moment, she is focusing on the world cross-country championships in Lausanne two weeks later.

That would give her time to get back on schedule after her early season training camp at Falls Creek was disrupted by advancing bush fires.

“It took me a long time to recover from the New York marathon,” she admitted. “And I did not really start training until January.

“Having said that training has been going OK. I am not flying but I am getting things done. I am spending more time now doing exercises to get my speed and bounce back so I expect I will run some 1,500m races this summer.”

O’Sullivan has already committed herself to competing in Lausanne and the decision was widely welcomed last week by the IAAF, pointing out they were thrilled to have the only woman to win both long and short course races back to back in the line-up for this year’s event.

However, there is no question of Ireland’s most treasured athlete attempting the double this time around.

“I don’t have my mind set on either the long course or short course at the moment,” she said. “I am waiting to hear from the AAI as to which race we can run best in as a team.”

The AAI had pre-selected her at 3,000m for the world championships in Birmingham and whether or not she competes remains to be seen.

“I am fit and well and training and I will be returning to the UK early in March,” she said.

Meanwhile there is also a doubt surrounding Keith Kelly’s participation in the world cross-country championship.

He was forced to withdraw from the European championships in December with what was thought to be a calf muscle problem. However, it was recently diagnosed that the problem was caused by a fracture.

It is healed and he is back jogging. He will accompany Mark Carroll to an altitude training camp in Albuquerque this week in the hope of making it. Obviously the short course trials in Dunleer, near his hometown, would be a target if all is going well.

Mark Carroll will compete in the Boston Marathon with John Treacy’s Irish record as a target but he will return from altitude in search of a qualifying standard for the world championships, possibly at 10,000m before that assignment.

Alastair Cragg, a certainty for selection for the world cross-country championships, claimed his place in the team for the world indoor championships when he won the 3,000m at the Golden Spike indoor meeting in Boston on Saturday night in 7:45.22 which is 10 seconds inside the qualifying standard for Birmingham.

He won a ferocious sprint over the closing laps that involved Noah Ngeny, the eventual runner-up, Vyacheslav Shabunin of Russia and another and Kenya’s pacemaker supreme, Martin Keino.

At the same meet Daniel Caulfield was just outside the qualifying standard when finishing third in the 800m in 1:48.62.

Geraldine Hendricken, who has already said she will not be sharp enough for the world indoor championships, finished 9th in the women’s 1,500m in which 39 year old Regina Jacobs set a world indoor record at 3:59.98.

The Carlow athlete competes at the Millrose Games next Friday night at Madison Square Garden.

Sinead Evans, a winner a week earlier in Boston, finished ninth behind Meseret Defar from Ethiopia in the women’s 3,000m in 9:12.27.