Sarah Lavin: Limerick hurling success shows funding works

“If you look at any sport – Formula 1, football teams, Dublin football or Limerick hurling – the more funding a sport gets, obviously success becomes easier to achieve.”

Wed, 01 Jun, 2022 - 15:50

Cathal Dennehy

When it comes to funding, Sarah Lavin is not one to waste her time or energy complaining about what the situation in Irish athletics should be. All the same, the Tokyo Olympian knows the relationship that exists between money and medals, and if there’s an area she’d like to see improved it’s the way Irish coaches are compensated.

For the past 20 years, the sprint hurdler from Limerick has been guided by Noelle Morrissey, who juggles full-time work with family life and copious hours of coaching each week at Emerald AC. Due to Lavin’s breakthrough season last year, when she became the second Irishwoman in history to break 13 seconds for 100m hurdles, international-level funding of €18,000 will come her way via Sport Ireland’s International Carding Scheme in 2022, but the 28-year-old can’t help feel such supports should extend to the chief driving force behind her performances.

“For my setup, I’d love for my coach to be funded,” she said. “If you look at any sport – Formula 1, football teams, Dublin football or Limerick hurling – the more funding a sport gets, obviously success becomes easier to achieve.”

It’s a curious coincidence that the Olympic champion in Lavin’s event, Jasmine Camacho-Quinn, is coached by an Irishman, John Coghlan. Though it says much about the structures at home that Coghlan had to leave his native country to find full-time work as an athletics coach. Either way, the situation doesn’t change Lavin’s mentality, or indeed the professionalism with which she and Morrissey conduct themselves.

“Athletes know what we need to do, we can’t keep giving out about X, Y or Z,” she said. “We have to go and do it. The standard of the sport is constantly improving, it’s harder (to compete at the top level) and it’s up to us as athletes to get better. That’s the business I’m in, getting better, and not giving out.”

It’s been a remarkable year so far, with Lavin clocking 7.97 to power into the world indoor 60m hurdles final in March, where she finished seventh. Her outdoor season picked up where that left off, Lavin clocking 13.00 in Germany last weekend, the second quickest time of her career.

Her best is the 12.95 she ran in Madrid last summer, which helped secure her a place at the Tokyo Olympics via world rankings. But Lavin’s performance at the Games – seventh in her heat in 13.16 – left a bitter taste.

“It’s still gnawing away. I still can’t believe that that’s what I came out with. But that’s the beauty of this year – learning. You can’t make excuses. You don’t want to be a loser; you want to be a winner.”

The big plus now is that Lavin has accrued such a wealth of ranking points that she doesn’t have to chase around the circuit ahead of next month’s World Championships in Oregon, though she’ll sharpen her fitness with three upcoming races in quick succession: the Continental Tour Gold meetings in Bydgoszcz, Poland, tomorrow and in Hengelo, the Netherlands, on Monday, followed by a silver-level meeting in Samorin, Slovakia next Thursday.

Her goal for the summer?

“I want to be in the European final, for sure, and once you’re in the final things are up for grabs,” she said. “From a World Championship perspective, I want to get out of the heat and improve. I finished 32nd in the Olympics – I sure as hell want to be better this year.”

Sarah Lavin was speaking at the launch of the 150th edition of the Irish Life Health National Track and Field Championships, which takes place in Morton Stadium on 25-26 June.