Heffernan walks away with 15th national title

Robert Heffernan put on a masterclass of race walking to win his 15th national title but felt the atmosphere ‘dead’ on day one of the Woodie’s DIY National Indoor Championships in Athlone on Saturday.

Heffernan (Togher AC) was close to 6 minute mile pace as he dominated the 5,000m race walk from the start. He crossed the line in 19:13.03, but felt a bit heavy, having been logging up some big mileage in training, and thought the atmosphere was lacking despite some excellent competition.

“I found it dead to be honest,” said Heffernan of the atmosphere. “It was just a very, very hard effort,” he said of his own performance. “It’s still a good time. Six minute miling is so fast. It’s a second a lap off it which makes 25 seconds,” alluding to his Irish record of 18:51.46.

Heffernan will go to Guadix in Spain in a week’s time for a ten day training camp before racing in Switzerland on St Patrick’s Day and then going to Morocco for a four week spell of altitude training.

Amy Foster (City of Lisburn) sped to a personal best of 7.33 seconds in the heats of the women’s 60m to book her place for the Europeans. “I’m just delighted I got my standard,” she said.

Heats were the order for the majority of day one which was a factor in the lack of energy and vibrancy. Day two always proves to be far more exciting, and so it proved, with the marquee athletes on view and the major medals at stake.

One of the marquee names, Derval O’Rourke (Leevale), tweeted that she was going to withdraw from Sunday’s competition after finishing 5th in the 60m hurdles in 8.16 seconds in Birmingham, blaming fatigue.

“The body is pretty good – tight from all the travel,” said O’Rourke yesterday. “Resting today and getting some work done tomorrow. Hopefully fine by Tuesday.”

There were some finals on the first day of competition and European cross-country team gold medallist Lizzie Lee (Leevale AC) won the 3,000m time in 9:45.63 while Olympic racewalker Laura Reynolds (Mohill AC) was a facile winner of the 3,000m Walk in 13:05.84.

Kelly Proper (Ferrybank AC) was busying herself between three events all afternoon and no sooner was she in the blocks for the 60m heats, she was on the run up getting ready to charge down and leap into the sand for the long jump. Proper won her specialist long jump with a distance of 5.91m. She later qualified for the final of the women’s 200m.

David Donegan (Clonliffe Harriers AC) didn’t quite reach the roof but won the men’s pole vault with a clearance of 4.60m for a ninth national indoor title.