Ambitious Gillick is refusing to rest on his laurels

DAVID GILLICK fulfilled two ambitions this year when he broke 45 seconds for 400m for the first time and then went on to make the final at the world championships in Berlin.

He was just half a second off a medal at the world championships and will go to the European championships in Barcelona next July as one of the favourites for a medal. He already has two European indoor gold medals among his collection but he wants to win an outdoor medal.

“It has been a great year for me,” he said. “I finished up in the world athletics final in Thessalonika in Greece and I came in sixth. But, let’s be honest, I was tired. It was such a long season.

“From the outset, back in June, I said I wanted to finish my season at the world athletics final in Greece. That would mean, to have enough points to get into it, I would have had to be consistent throughout the season. And that would have shown exactly how the season went. It worked out well – I got there (world finals) and I came in sixth – but I was tired. Looking back it’s been a great year for me but there’s a lot more to do.

“When I look back at all the pictures of Berlin I actually don’t like the way I was running. I was too tight – and that kind of shows that maybe there was a little bit more there. That’s good because I don’t want to finish the season thinking I am brilliant and then forget about what I need to improve on. There is so much to improve on.

“I am home now and it’s great. I just love coming back to Dublin. I love coming home and catching up with my mates and things like that and just being normal – eating what I want to eat and drinking whatever. That’s what it’s all about – just enjoying it now and switching off.

“Looking to the future I’d like to think there is a major medal out there. Sport is fickle – just look at Bernard Dunne – on top of the world one moment and nine minutes later he was taken down. That’s what sport is. Some days you’re up and some days you’re down and you can never, ever get complacent.

“It was always my goal to break 45 seconds initially and then make a global final and I have done that. I look back now and think there was an opportunity there to get a medal and that’s why I have that little bit in my stomach going ‘maybe yes, maybe no, maybe I didn’t run that well’ and that’s good. You don’t want to be complacent or getting laid back.”

Meanwhile the field for the women’s race at the world cross-country championships in Dublin in December will feature the European women’s athlete of the year Marta Domínguez of Spain who has been voted women’s European Athlete of the Year Award by MONDO.

The double European 5000m champion – she beat Ireland’s Sonia O’Sullivan for the first of those titles in Munich seven years ago – finally realised her dream of IAAF World Championships gold in Berlin when she stunned the field with her devastating finish to win the women’s 3000m steeplechase with a new national record 9:07.32 – a European-leading mark of the season. Domínguez was the only European to win a track gold at this year’s worlds.