Britton’s golden moment arrives

FIONNUALA BRITTON put the golden seal of approval on a tremendous year for Irish athletics when she claimed the senior women’s title at the 18th SPAR European Cross-Country championships in Slovenia yesterday.

It was a long overdue reward for the diminutive Wicklow woman who had a bronze medal snatched from her in the closing stages of last year’s race in Albufeira.

She won a silver medal in the U23 race at those championships in Italy in 2006 and she broke the winner of that race, Turkey’s Binnaz Uslu, long before half way yesterday.