The race is already on for the latest addition to the Irish athletics medal rush, Precious Akpe-Moses putting herself into contention by making the 100 metres final on day one of the European Under-20 Championships.
Akpe-Moses stormed through her heat and semi-final during Thursday’s opening sessions in Tampere, Finland improving her lifetime best to 11.62 seconds when nailing her automatic final spot by finishing second in her semi-final.
The younger sister of Gina Apke-Moses, who won this 100m title at the European Under-20 100m title back in 2017, her semi-final time improved her previous best of 11.64 and she’ll go into Friday’s final ranked fourth fastest overall.
Racing in the third of three semi-finals, Apke-Moses needed to make the top two to ensure qualification, and did exactly that – the athlete from Blackrock AC, in Louth, finishing second to Uliana Stepaniuk from Ukraine, who is still only 17, and who improved her best to 11.50 when winning.
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Conor Kelly went into his 400m heat the top ranked under-20 in Europe, his 45.85 clocked at the Morton Games last month the only sub-46 second entry. The Finn Valley AC athlete, who turned 18 last month, qualified with ease, winning his heat in 46.94 seconds, clearly keeping plenty in reserve.
Sean Doggett, from Athenry AC, also finished second in his heat in 47.59 to secure automatic qualification for Friday’s semi-finals.
Cormac Dixon is also the top-ranked athlete in the 3,000m, running 7:56.59 indoors in the US earlier this season, and the Tallaght AC athlete also cruised through, finishing fourth in his heat in 8:19.80 – that final set for Saturday’s evening session.
Cian Crampton, from Edenderry AC, made it safely through to Saturday’s final of the discus, ranked fourth overall with his best throws of 57.94m to finish second in Group A.
A big performance from Theo Hanlon (Suncroft AC) in the men’s shot put qualifiers also landed him in the final, with a best of 18.00m.
There were a couple of near misses, Gemma Galvin, from Ennis Track AC, flailing just short of making the 1,500m final after running 4:25.06 to finish seventh in her heat. She ended up ranked 13th overall, with the top 12 progressing.
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Oisin Lynch, from Killarney Valley AC, also missed out on a place in the 800m final, running 1:50.88 to finish fifth in his heat, while Ethan Dewhirst (Tir Chonaill AC) was disqualified for a false start in his 400m hurdles heat.
In the 50 years since John Treacy claimed Ireland’s first medal in these championships, winning bronze in the 5,000m in Athens in 1975, plenty of other successful names have followed in his footsteps, including Mark Carroll, Ciara Mageean, Sarah Lavin, Sarah Healy, Kate O’Connor and Rhasidat Adeleke.
In the last month alone, Irish athletes have won 11 international medals, Kate O’Connor winning gold in the heptathlon at the World University Games, before Nicola Tuthill added silver in the hammer.
Tuthill also won the silver medal at the European Under-23 Championships in Bergen, Norway, one of four Irish athletes to win medals there, along with Anika Thompson (gold in the 10,000m and bronze in the 5,000), Nick Griggs (silver in the 5,000m) and Eimear Maher (bronze in the 1,500m).
At the European Youth Olympics in Skopje, North Macedonia last month, another four Irish athletes won medals: Erin Friel and Ben Sykes won bronze in the 400m and 100m respectively, before Ellis McHugh and Joe Burke also won bronze in the 400m hurdles and 200m respectively.
Elsewhere, Sarah Lavin was back in action days after winning her 10th Irish title in the 100m hurdles, and took another impressive win at the Serbia Athletics Meeting in Belgrade, which is part of World Athletics Continental Tour Bronze series, clocking 12.90 seconds.
