Ciara Mageean: 'I find it a bit frustrating, a bit insulting, a bit annoying. I know I’m clean'

Mageean is tested five to 10 times a year by Sport Ireland, with at least one out-of-competition test each quarter. She believes the landscape is improving at global level.

Tue, 13 Sep, 2022 - 06:55

Cathal Dennehy

Given the altitudes she now inhabits, she knows this comes with the territory. There are sports where big breakthroughs are met with blind eyes, but Ciara Mageean knows that in athletics, people will ask this question. So when the topic of doping is raised, she takes no offence.

In New York on Sunday, the 30-year-old closed her season with a sub-par showing at the Fifth Avenue Mile, fading to finish 17th in 4:30. It was a run beset by fatigue from recent efforts, with Mageean smashing Sonia O’Sullivan’s Irish 1500m record to clock 3:56.63 and win in Brussels followed by a superb runner-up finish at the Diamond League final in Zurich.