O'Sullivan bows out with silver

Sonia O'Sullivan ran her last ever track race in Ireland this afternoon, finishing second in the 5000 metres at the Woodie's DIY National Senior Track & Field Championships in Santry.

O'Sullivan, with 12 Irish senior track titles to her name, looked comfortable throughout but Dubliner Maria McCambridge had an extra gear and took gold in a time of 16 minutes and 1 second.

It was McCambridge's first win at the championships since her 5000 success in 2004.

O'Sullivan, who clocked 16:34 this afternoon in drizzly conditions, said afterwards: "It was a good run - as good as I've been doing in training. I was hoping to have a chance maybe to win it but Maria had other ideas and put in a good, strong run.

"But it was really good to be able to come here and race. This is probably my last national championships."

The Cobh woman won her first national senior title back in 1987 in the 1500m.

Now aged 37, O'Sullivan won the 800m in 1992, 2000 and 2002, she struck gold in the 1500 in 1987, 1990, 1995, 1996 and 2000, and was successful over 5000m in 1990, 1998, 2002 and 2003.

In the other early events at Morton Stadium today, UCC athlete Orla Drumm made up for finishing second last year by winning the 800m title in a personal best time of 2 minutes, 06.15 seconds. Lisburn's Kelly Reid was a close second in 2:06.32.

Robert Heffernan's dominance of the 10000m track walk continued as he struck gold in the event for the fifth time in seven years. The Togher athlete clocked 39 minutes, 11.78 seconds to take the victory, with Colin Griffin, this year's 20k walk champion, forty seconds behind in second place.

In the field, Raheny's Paddy McGrath was victorious in the hammer - his winning throw was 66.96 metres - and Kelly Proper from Ferrybank retained her long jump crown with a leap of 6.17m.