McCarthy goes the extra distance to get it right

MARTIN McCARTHY completed his preparations for Sunday’s Ballycotton 10 in most unusual circumstances at the weekend.

McCarthy won the Eagle five-miler at Carrigaline in just under 25 minutes on Sunday morning but en route to the line, he ran 15 miles to complete his 20-mile training run.

The day before he measured 15 miles back from the starting line and timed it almost to perfection a minute's silence before the race helped him finish his preparations. Notably, he completed the final mile of the event (his 20th mile) in 4 mins 46 secs. "That's what I need for the marathon," he said ahead of next month's trip to London, where he competes alongside Mark Carroll and cross-country specialists Seamus Power and Peter Matthews as well as Gary Crossan.

McCarthy's achievement was all the more remarkable, as he damaged abdominal muscles in the national cross country championship in Roscommon a week ago.

"Thankfully, I had absolutely no problems with it," he said. "I felt nothing when I was running at a tempo pace, although when I warmed down afterwards I felt it. "I was pretty sore the day after Roscommon but then that was to be expected. I ran for 5k in dreadful pain that day thinking it would go away but it only got worse.

"I was able to train last week I did 110 miles so it did not affect my mileage."

McCarthy, Seamus Power and Peter Matthews are the headline Irish men in Ballycotton. They will be joined by two Kenyans, Charles Kiplaga, who won the Loughrea 5 and finished fourth in the Dublin marathon last year, and Issac Kimuge. Noel Berkeley, is also amontht entries as well as four time winner, John Griffin from Tralee. Bashir Hussain (Stockport Harriers), Andrew Swearman (Birchfield Harriers) the Welsh super-vet, Martin Rees, is also included. "It is a very important race as regards discovering where I am at right now and I am sure the others feel the same way about it," he said.

Gary Ryan returned to the Olympic Stadium in Homebush at the weekend and finished third in his heat of the 200m at the Australian Championships in 21.13 secs. David Geddes won it in 20.93 secs with James Dolphin of New Zealand second in 21.06.

Derval O'Rourke has begun her build-up to the outdoor season after recovering from two slight injuries at the Indoor Championships in Belfast.

Ciara Sheehy and Paul Hession head for the world indoor championships in Budapest at the weekend.