McGonagle 'confident' of peak performances

Medals may prove beyond them, but Ireland's track and field stars could be in for a record-breaking few weeks at the Beijing Olympics.

Irish athletics team manager Patsy McGonagle is currently overseeing their preparations at a training camp in Matsue, Japan.

He revealed that the team will be primed for personal best performances when the Olympic athletics programme begins on August 15.

"It's all about performances. I'm confident. The indications are that the athletes are confident and the preparation and everything has been done," said the Ballybofey man.

"If they get up to their normal performance levels, they're really up there. If you can be as good as you can be (on the day), that's where you want to be."

Although injury doubts still surround Derval O'Rourke (groin), Eileen O'Keeffe (knee), Joanne Cuddihy (calf) and Alistair Cragg (Achilles tendon), McGonagle is remaining positive.

"You have to be positive and upbeat about these things. Alistair's flying out to join us, after spending a few days getting treatment in Munich.

"Eileen's progressing, it's slow but she's getting there. She's got time on her side, with a couple of weeks left, and it's the same with Derval.

"We'll have a look at them all in Japan and get settled into the training camp. It'll be another few days before we can give an indication on their fitness."

The Irish team used the same Matsue base for their preparations for last year's World Championships in Osaka and that worked out well with hammer thrower O'Keeffe and race walker Rob Heffernan gaining sixth place finishes in their events.

"That's why we went there last year. That was a kind of dummy run really to see if it would work or not work.

"It worked extremely well. The facilities are perfect, the support system is perfect, the hotel was very good, the food was grand. All the things you look for were A1.

"The athletes have their own personal training programmes. Obviously, there's the opportunity to go to the track in the morning before it gets too warm," McGonagle added, on the subject of training camp work.

"Get used to the heat, bit by bit. Then again in the evening when the sun's not too serious and the humidity's not too serious.

"Just try to break into it, so that we're pretty accumstomed to the heat and humidity when we get into the competition phase in Beijing."

This will be McGonagle's third Olympics - his first was Sydney back in 2000 - and he explained just how pressurised his job can get, with even the smallest of things requiring his attention.

"There's different emotions in this day and age, for me, because I've done it before.

"The excitement's kinda gone out of it, it's just about ensuring that everything goes according to plan day on day on day. That's the way you approach it.

"It can be a really stressful job, because it's a day on day job.

"You've got to ensure you get all the little bits and pieces and put them all together which makes a big, big thing - all the little, little things - at the end of it all. It's a very, very committed job."