Team manager Patsy McGonagle hailed the efforts of Ireland's top track and field stars as they finished a very credible eighth in the European Team Championships 1st League event in Budapest.

DERVAL O’ROURKE is hoping that the home fans will give her the lift she needs in advance of the Olympic Games when she returns to The Mardyke — where it all began for her — for today’s Cork City Sports.

WORLD indoor 60m hurdles champion Derval O’Rourke, who did not compete last year, will be surrounded by familiar faces when she bids to reclaim her national 60m hurdles title at this month’s Woodies DIY Irish Indoor Championships at the Odyssey Arena in Belfast.

Kenya-born Bernard Lagat won a fifth World Championship gold medal for Team USA in Osaka and then proclaimed: “I feel very special.”

WITH the Olympic Games just around the corner, the world championships, which get under way in Osaka today, has been described as a ‘dress rehearsal’ for Beijing by Patsy McGonagle, Athletics Ireland’s first full-time senior team manager.

DERVAL O’ROURKE passed a major milestone in her build-up to the World Championships when she broke 13 seconds for the first time this season at last night’s IAAF Grand Prix meeting in Lausanne.

AFTER a weekend that has given much promise for the rest of the season, Derval O’Rourke will be back among the best 100m hurdlers in the world at the Grand Prix 1 meeting in Lausanne tonight.

DERVAL O’ROURKE rediscovered her winning form in the women’s 100m hurdles while David Gillick put the memories of his false start at The Mardyke behind him with an emphatic victory in the men’s 400m at the Honved International in Budapest last night.

PAUL HESSION will be chasing Paul Brizzell’s national 200m record at The Mardyke on Saturday afternoon when some of the world’s best athletes will assemble for Cork City Sports.

AFTER breaking the national 100m record for the second time this season with 10.18 secs for second place Saturday, Paul Hession put the finishing touches to a sensational weekend at the European Cup in Vaasa, Finland, by beating European silver medallist, Johan Wissman (Sweden), in the 200m yesterday.

DERVAL O’ROURKE renews rivalry with European indoor and outdoor hurdles champion Susanna Kallur at the European Cup in Vaasa, Finland this weekend on a crucial weekend for Irish athletics.

DERVAL O’ROURKE finished last of the seven competitors in her Golden League 100m hurdles race at the Bislett Games in Oslo last night, in a time of 13.19 secs.

DERVAL O’ROURKE and Paul Hession head to the first Golden League meeting of the year — the Bislett Games in Oslo tonight — hoping for better weather than that which greeted them at an international meeting in Stavanger, Norway on Wednesday night.

Swedish sprint star Susanna Kallur and new Russian high jump sensation Ivan Ukhov have been voted the European Athletes of the Month for January.

Ireland's hurdling heroine Derval O'Rourke will sit out the European Indoor Championships in March due to a back injury.

Derval O'Rourke struggled to seventh in the 100 metres hurdles at the Weltklasse/IAAF Gold League meeting in Zurich tonight.

DERVAL O’ROURKE left for Zurich’s Weltklasse yesterday, following a path that has been well worn by the likes of Eamonn Coghlan, Ray Flynn, Marcus O’Sullivan, Frank O’Mara, Mark Carroll and Sonia O’Sullivan.

Derval O’Rourke clinched silver in the 100 metres hurdles at the European Championships in Gothenburg tonight in an Irish record time of 12.72 seconds.

DERVAL O’ROURKE, cautious rather than spectacular, eased her way into the semi-finals of the 100m hurdles at the European championships in Gothenburg with a performance that earned her a centre lane in this evening’s semi-finals — and an outstanding chance of making the final later on where she will be a contender for the bronze medal at least.

Joanne Cuddihy finished last in a tonight’s European Championships 400 metres final.

Ireland’s Derval O’Rourke has breezed into tomorrow’s 100 metres hurdles semi-finals.

Derval O'Rourke hopes to join a select group of Irish athletes when she guns for glory in Gothenburg next week.

Cork hurdler Derval O'Rourke continued her preparations for next month's European Championships by almost nabbing another national record tonight.

The President and the Government today congratulated Co Cork athlete Derval O’Rourke on winning gold at the World Indoor Championships in Moscow.

Ireland’s Derval O’Rourke has won the 60 metres hurdles gold medal on the second day of the World Indoor Championships in Moscow.

SINCE her sensational victory as a 17 year old back in 1987, when she beat a star-studded field in the women’s 3,000m, Sonia O’Sullivan has been a star attraction at The Mardyke.