Ankrom insists target of 24 medals is realistic

Athletics Ireland publicly rolled out their High Performance plan for the next Olympic cycle at the Gresham Hotel yesterday with the vision of “more Irish athletes winning on the world stage” and a target of 24 medals being won at major championships between 2013 and 2016.

High Performance director Kevin Ankrom believes he has done his “homework” and that the 29-page document laden with statistics is articulating what Athletics Ireland are already doing as opposed to any lofty ideal.

“I’ve done my homework,” said Ankrom. “This is evidence-based and not about waving a magic wand.

“This document is articulating what we’re doing. It’s not airy-fairy. We’re actually doing it. In terms of hiring coaches, we’ve just hired one in Chris Jones for endurance.

“In terms of medical back-up, we have the services in place and are now making it more practical and cost effective.”

Ankrom believes this “a la carte menu” services approach will deliver medals, including 12 this year with two — bronze medals over 3,000m by Fionnuala Britton and Ciaran O’Lionaird — having been already won at the European Indoor Championships in March.

“I’m targeting 12 medals this year, but then we have a lot of meets,” said Ankrom of championships that range from the European Junior Track & Field Championships in Rieti, Italy in July to the World Track and Field Championship in Moscow in August, where they are targeting one medal with Robert Heffernan.

For the Olympic carnival in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, Ankrom envisions Irish athletes in contention for medals on the biggest stage.

“I’m not saying we have a medallist at this time. What I will say is that we will have athletes knocking on the door of medals. They will be mainly coming from this cycle because I think most of those from 2008 and 2012 are dropping off now. The challenge there is to keep it going.”

To keep it going Ankrom is targeting the 19-23 age group, which includes athletes such as Mark English, Paul Robinson, Brian Gregan and Ciara Everard.

“What we’ve seen, if you look at the data, is that only 8% of athletes who make the top eight at a World Junior Championships repeat that on the senior stage, while that increases to 80% of those who make the top eight at U23 level.”

Financial investment, as in the past, will be largely made from “the top down”, although with some shift focus to the 19-23 age group.

“The 19-23 age group is the key pool for our investment,” he said.

Ankrom’s goals for the plan are clear: “Podium performances over a sustained period of time so that, ultimately, Athletics Ireland is viewed as one of the leading high performance programmes in the country.”

* To see the entire document log on to www.athleticsireland.ie.