Kiely smashes record to strike gold in Turkey
On another spectacular day for Irish athletes the Tramore CBS schoolboy — Irish schools intermediate champion — took the title in a sizzling personal best time of 52.69, almost a second faster than the Irish Youths record he set at 53.66 secs.
Coming off what was not the best of starts, he was placed fifth with three hurdles to go, but he maintained his form and composure to remain in a challenging position until the approach to the final hurdle. He attacked the final obstacle, overtook Jacob Paul (Great Britain) and stormed to a thrilling victory.
Ben’s twin sister, Megan, a student at Ursuline Convent, Waterford, also performed magnificently yesterday — although somewhat in the shadow of her brother — to take the bronze medal in the girls’ 400m hurdles.
In another exciting race, she missed out on silver by just two 100ths of a second crossing the line in 60.44secs. She is the second Irish girl to claim a medal in this event following Christine McMahon (Ballymena and Antrim) who won silver in 2009.
Sarah Lavin (Emerald AC) claimed another bronze medal for Ireland in the 100m hurdles and, in the process, improved the Irish youths record she set in the heats when finishing third in 13.62secs. One has to go back to 1995 to find the last Irish winner of a medal in this event when Grainne Redmond also took the bronze.
Ciara Giles Doran (Ferrybank AC) set a lifetime best in the 200m semi-final with 24.46secs for third place which got her into today’s final. She had a double in the 200m and 300m hurdles at this year’s Aviva Irish schools championships.
Marcus Lawler (St Laurence O’Tooles AC, Carlow) also made it through to the final of the boys’ 200m after improving his own Irish Youth record by one hundredth of a second to win his heat in 21.62 secs to qualify.
Karl Griffin (Tír Chonaill AC) will also be in action today when he lines up for the final of the boy’s 800m.
The Irish girls’ 4 x 100m team of Sarah Lavin, Grainne Moynihan, Megan Kiely and Ciara Giles Doran finished second in their heat in 47.63secs to qualify for today’s final. But the boys’ 4x100m relay team of Ben Kiely, Greg O’Shea, Karl Griffin and Marcus Lawler did not make the final despite finishing sixth in a new Irish youth record of 42.67 secs.
Matthew Martin finished just one place outside qualification in the boy’s javelin with a new pb of 62.72m.
With Ruairi Finnegan winning gold in the 1,500m and Siofra Cleirigh Buttner silver in the girl’s 1,500m, this is the most successful Irish performance at the EYOF and there is still a day to go. The team arrives home tomorrow.
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