Efrem Gidey breaks Irish 10km record in Valencia

Cormac Dalton, who was part of the silver-medal-winning Irish team at the European Cross Country last month alongside O’Leary and Dalton, missed out on that after clocking 28:04, while Callum Morgan – who recently helped the Irish U23 team to gold at the Europeans – clocked a big PB of 28:09.

IRISH RECORD: Efrem Gidey broke his own Irish 10km record when clocking 27:39 in Valencia on Sunday morning, the 25-year-old carving four seconds off the mark he ran in the same race last year. Picture: ©INPHO/Morgan Treacy

Efrem Gidey broke his own Irish 10km record when clocking 27:38 in Valencia on Sunday morning, the 25-year-old carving five seconds off the mark he ran in the same race last year.

His 12th-place finish in the Valencia Ibercaja 10km led a slew of fast times among the travelling Irish contingent, with Mullingar’s Jack O’Leary also smashing his PB to finish 18th in 27:41, securing the 10,000m qualifying standard (27:50) for the European Championships in Birmingham in August.

Cormac Dalton, who was part of the silver-medal-winning Irish team at the European Cross Country last month alongside O’Leary and Dalton, missed out on that after clocking 28:03, while Callum Morgan – who recently helped the Irish U23 team to gold at the Europeans – clocked a big PB of 28:08.

Ava Crean, the 19-year-old Limerick athlete who won the national marathon title in Dublin last October, also carved a whopping chunk off her PB, clocking 32:46. Crean is currently in training for the Boston Marathon in April.

“After Dublin, I took a week or two off and then it was cross country, and that didn’t work out for me,” she said. “Then we focused on the 10K, that’s what we’ve been focusing on for the past four weeks and I’ll probably take a few days off now and start training for Boston.” 

It was a cool, still, sunny morning in Valencia, a city renowned for fast times, and the field utilised the conditions and the flat course, with Sweden’s Andreas Almgren setting a European record out front of 26:45, followed home by Ethiopia’s Khaira Bejiga (26:52). Kenya’s Brenda Kipchirchir took victory in the women’s race in 29:25 ahead of Ethiopia’s Likina Amebaw (29:29).