Irish star, Mark English (UCD) delivered a great performance to win the men’s 800m in the European Team Championships League 1 in Vaasa, Finland.
The Ireland track and field team put in commendable displays across 40 individual events to finish a 8th in the biannual European event on 238 points.
The women scored 124 points with the men scoring 114 – divided by 167 on the track and 71 in the field. The event was won by Sweden on 320.5 points. They were promoted to the Super League alongside event hosts Finland and Switzerland. English has been in supreme form of late and also anchored the men’s 4x400m relay team to a second place finish in 3:05.08 which included U20 athlete Christopher O’Donnell (North Sligo) on the first leg, Brian Gregan (Clonliffe Harriers) and Thomas Barr (Ferrybank).
The Irish women also finished second overall in the women’s 4×400 relay in 3:32.65 with the quartet of Sinead Denny (DSD), Phil Healy (Bandon), Jenna Bromell (Emerald) and Sharlene Mawdsley (Newport).
There were a number of good performances by athletes stepping up to the plate on international duty. Sarah McCarthy (Mid Sutton) produced a 6.21m season’s best for fourth in the long jump which was also a European U23 A standard. Niamh Fogarty (North Westmeath) equalled her personal best of 13.10m in the shot put with Ann-Marie McGlynn (Letterkenny) also scoring a personal best for sixth in the 5,000m in 16:03.64. There was heartbreak for Marcus Lawler (SLOT) in the men’s 200m who bravely walked the final 100m after pulling his hamstring in contention around the bend. Lawler hobbled across the line in 1:23.93 all to score valuable points for the team and maintain Ireland’s status in League 1.
Team manager Patsy McGonagle said: “The European cup is complete and I’m proud as always of our Irish athletes’ attitude. To me this team all working for each other is special.”