Nolan predicting medals return from Irish paralympians

IRISH paralympic team manager James Nolan is predicting a return of at least two medals from the IPC world championships, which take place in Christchurch from January 21-30.

Although injury has ruled out Ireland’s most prolific Paralympic athlete Jason Smyth, the Derry man who made history by becoming the first Paralympian to compete in a European athletics championships and went on to reach the semi-final of the 100m in Barcelona last year, the team still possesses two strong favourites in 800m world record holder Michael McKillop from Newtonabbey and Cork’s discus champion, Orla Barry.

The eight-strong team is en route to New Zealand today to acclimatise for the championships and two-time Olympian Nolan, who is Head of Paralympic athletics in Ireland, is very upbeat.

“We have three very experienced athletes who’ve been to many world championships and Paralympic Games – Garrett Culliton from Laois, Catherine Wayland from Wexford and Rosemarie Tallon from Louth.

“Our two medal hopes are Michael McKillop in 800m and Orla Barry, who is the current European record holder in discus. I would expect both those athletes to come back with podium positions.

“Then we have three young emerging athletes who will be using the championship as experience for London in 2012 in Ray O’Dwyer, Ailish Dunne, Nadine Lattimore.

“At the same time, one person from the experienced group and one person from the emerging group can win medals. I don’t want to put pressure on either individual – the other two can handle it because they’re ranked high in the world – but there are two athletes that are training really well at the moment and I’d be hoping that one of them can push from fourth, fifth position up onto the podium and pick up a sneaky bronze.”

Nolan knows all about major championships, having competed at both the Sydney and Athens Olympics, as well as a world and European championships. A silver medal in the European indoors in Ghent 11 years ago was the highlight of his career before he branched into the Fastkids programme in 2008, which concentrates on providing physical activity to national school children.

A coach at UCD, his role was “fleshed out” to athletics director but he jumped at the chance to take on the role with the Paralympic Council of Ireland for the world championships and next year’s Paralympic Games.

“It was a good opportunity for me. They’ve been getting some good results but this was an opportunity to get some more exposure for Paralympic athletics, because the guys are really operating at the top echelons of sport, never mind the disability. “

Indeed he finds their efforts inspirational.

“When you see guys who are visually impaired like Jason Smyth; it’s little things that people don’t realise. He doesn’t see exactly where the ground is so sometimes he hits the ground a bit too hard.

“Michael, with cerebral palsy, is landing towards the front of his foot. The sort of work he has to do to loosen out all the muscles in his legs… Nobody knows all the extra things they have to do on top of the training that able-bodied athletes do.

“If the likes of myself or other athletes in the past were complaining about our workload, these guys have to do even more.”