Terrific Travers raises the roof

With grown men banging the blue-boarded track and a raucous crowd standing on their feet as John Travers broke eight minutes for the 3,000m, it truly was Super Sunday at the Woodie’s DIY National Indoor Championships in Athlone in a day to remember for Irish athletics aficionados.

It looked like the novelty had worn off on Ciarán Ó Cathain’s international arena on Saturday with a relatively sparse crowd and a lack of that intangible buzz, but Fionnuala Britton’s comprehensive win in the women’s 1500m, the first event yesterday, was only a taste of things to come.

Britton, under the tutelage of Chris Jones, has managed to find an extra set of gears of late and, with close to a full crowd in attendance, she efficiently stirred the crowd out of first gear as she ran a big personal best of 4:13.96 knocking nine seconds off her previous best indoor time.