Smyth storms to breakthrough win in Tullamore

JASON SMYTH yesterday became the first Irish Paralympic athlete to qualify for a major able-bodied championship.

Visually impaired Smyth, who won two sprinting gold medals at the Paralympics in Beijing last year, broke his 100m record with a spectacular 10.42 at the Woodie’s DIY National Junior and U23 Championship in Tullamore.

It is the fourth quickest time for the distance by an Irish sprinter and secures Smyth’s place at next year’s European Athletics Championships in Barcelona.

His coach, Stephen Maguire, was thrilled with the result and is confident Smyth’s achievement will “break all sorts of barriers” for disabled athletes.

He said: “It wasn’t a shock. Training has been going very well and his times have been coming down in recent months. We had a very good training camp in Florida and have been building on the work we did in the US.”

Maguire is confident that qualification for such a prestigious event will have financial implications for the City of Derry athlete. “There was lots of interest after the Paralympics last year but because of the economic downturn many of those didn’t come to fruition. He has a deal with Nike until 2012 but this will open doors for Jason.

“Hopefully sponsors will sit up and take notice. Jason is a wonderful young man and a fabulous role model. A result like this will break down all sorts of barriers for disabled athletes in Ireland and perhaps beyond.”

Niamh Whelan, (Ferrybank AC), was also in top form winning the junior women’s 100m in 11.68 seconds while the multi-talented Kelly Proper (Ferrybank AC), completed an impressive double, winning the U23 long jump with a 6.33m and the 200m in 24.04 seconds.

Brian Gregan (Tallaght AC) followed up a fine international victory in Belgium over 400m on Saturday night (46.85 seconds) by setting a personal best of 21.58 seconds when winning the U23 200m title.

Ciara Everard (KCH) lived up to her pre-race favourite tag when winning the junior women’s 800m in 2.11.2 and Darren McBrearty (Letterkenny AC) won the junior men’s title over the same distance in 1.53.68.

John Coghlan (MSB) kept the family middle distance running tradition alive claiming the U23 men’s 1500m in 3.50.42 after a thrilling race.

The strength in depth of Irish race walking was evident on Saturday in the Phoenix Park as Irish Olympians, Robert Heffernan (Togher AC) and Olive Loughnane (Loughrea AC), beat quality international competition to win their respective 20km events in the Grand Prix of Race Walking.

Loughnane was delighted with her victory in 1:30.57 ahead of Portugal’s Susanna Fector (1:31.37) and Olympic bronze medallist, Elisa Rigiundo of Italy (1:33.49).

Meanwhile Heffernan toyed with a strong international field in the men’s race before striking out on his own to achieve an impressive win in 1:23.35 ahead of Irish team mate, Colin Griffin, (Ballinamore AC) (1:24.12) and Spain’s Francisco Arcillo in 1:25.45.