O’Sullivan getting back down to earth at Mardyke

SONIA O’SULLIVAN will be looking to tomorrow’s 1500 metres at the BUPA Ireland Cork City Sports to measure her form following Tuesday night’s disappointing 3000m run in Lausanne, where she finished a remote ninth to runaway Russian Yelena Zadorozhnaya.

Yesterday, the Olympic silver medallist was willing to put the performance behind her and put it down to the fact that she had only arrived back down to sea level the day before, having spent a month training at altitude in the Alpine resort of St Moritz.

“After training at altitude is can be very unpredictable and you just don’t know what to expect,” O’Sullivan said. “You feel fine but you just can’t tell what kind of form you are in until you run. It is more like a blood thing so it is not something that is obvious or that you can see.