Irish stars set to shine in Kentucky
Last weekend’s conference finals brought victories over 800 metres for Clonmel’s Thomas Chamney and 3,000m for Mullingar’s Martin Fagan at the Big EAST championships in Akron, Ohio, while former Irish junior national champion Michelle Gallagher took a Metro Atlantic title over 5,000m, her eighth conference honour for New York’s Iona College since 2004.
Chamney’s successful defence of his title helped Notre Dame to its third conference indoor title in five years. Clocking 1:51.76 for victory, the Irishman also ran the anchor leg on Notre Dame’s winning 4x800-metre relay quartet. Fagan, running for Providence College, retained his 3,000m title in a time of 8:05.26, a new track record at the University of Akron Athletics Field House in a championships at which Mark Carroll still holds the meet record at 8:01.56, also in Providence colours, set in 1995.
The focus will this weekend switch to Lexington, Kentucky, when the University of Kentucky hosts the powerhouse South-eastern Conference (SEC) indoor track and field championships. Meath’s Colin Costello should feature on an Arkansas team defending its champions’ status and chasing its 81st conference title (cross-country, indoor and outdoor), all of them since the mid-1970s under the guidance of Mayo-born head coach John McDonnell. Arkansas has won the last two SEC indoor team titles and nine of the last 10, including a seven-season streak (1997-2003 inclusive).
Yet they go into this year’s three-day meet, starting on Friday, suffering a collective drop in form that has seen them slip from first to eighth in the national Trackwire.com Top 25 rankings and is ranked seventh in the US Track and Field Coaches’ poll.
Arkansas press officer Molly O’Mara said Costello could run in the 800m, a distance at which he lowered his personal best last month to 1:52.51, or the mile — or both — while he has also impressed coach McDonnell in a Distance Medley Relay quartet this season.
Also set for duty in Kentucky this weekend is Kildare’s Rose-Marie Galligan, a freshman at the nationally seventh-ranked University of Tennessee. Following a slow start to college life during the cross-country season, Galligan has seen the fruits of working with Tennessee’s renowned middle-distance coach JJ Clark since the start of the current semester. She has recorded personal best times at 800m (2:09.45), the mile (4:46.32) and 3000m (9:50.83) since Christmas, her mile time good enough to earn a provisional mark for the NCAA Championships next month.
Galligan, 19, has the fifth fastest mile time in the conference this season going into the weekend, and the ninth fastest over 3,000m and has also been a key component on the lead-off leg in the Lady Volunteers’ Distance Medley Relay team ranked sixth in the US in the latest Trackwire.com lists.
Cork middle-distance man Ciaran O’Lionaird, meanwhile, could make his championship debut for the University of Michigan in the mile at the Big Ten Championships in Bloomington, Indiana.
Others scoring victories at last week’s Big East championships included Providence graduate student Aine Hoban, Yorkshire-born to parents from Mayo and whose uncle is Mayo football manager John O’Mahony.
Hoban won the women’s 5,000m in 16:16.67, nine seconds ahead of the next finisher. Hoban, a British U-23 international, also took second place in the 3,000m in 9:29.47.
Villanova men’s head coach Marcus O’Sullivan picked up a victory in the 400m thanks to Elvis Lewis, a sophomore from New York, as his team finished 10th.
While the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference has nowhere near the same depth of talent as the Big East, Iona’s Michelle Gallagher still beat everyone that went to the line with her in the women’s 5000m in New York. San Francisco-born Gallagher clocked 18:16.06 and also claimed third in an Iona sweep over 3000m as Mick Byrne’s women’s team finished fourth at the 2007 MAAC Championships. Byrne’s Iona men placed third.
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