Irwin Gold medal the highlight of a really successful weekend for Sligo AC

A number of Sligo AC athletes made the very worthwhile trip up North this weekend to Magherafelt Co Derry for the National Juvenile All Ireland Indoor Championships. With an early start for the 60m heats there were great openers from both Kerrs, Graham and Stacey, and Ania Bednorz when all 3 athletes secured places in the 60m finals to be held later that day, Colm Bourke ran a fine race in his 60m heat just missing qualification for the final. Onto the finals, first up was Kevin McGlynn who went agonisingly close to a bronze medal in the u-19 boys 60m where he finished in 4th place but will have taken great confidence from his run, Ania Bednorz ran an excellent race where she mixed it all the way to the line to finish a close 7th in a new personal best time of 8.23 seconds. Both Kerrs went one after the other with Stacey first up and she flew out of the blocks and was involved in a blanket finish and resulted with a 5th place finish again with a new personal best of 8.25 seconds, Graham too can be really happy with his performance when he finished in a very close 5th place lowering his best to 8.39 seconds.
Onto our frst medal of the day, Zak Irwin (pictured no.458) drawn out on his own in lane 9 flew from the blocks and ran strong all the way to the line to win in fine style. Zak can be proud of his achievements as he is so new to sprinting at this level and has adopted to it in fine style. He will now concentrate on his 200m National bid in 2 weeks time.
Leo Doherty (pictured no 392) secured Sligo AC medal number 2 in the u-12 boys 600m, getting off to a slow start he quickly made up the ground going out onto the second lap of 2 and rounding into the home straight Leo took up the running only to be "collared" close to home by a young Donegal athlete. This was an amazing run by this fine young Sligo athlete and he can look forward to a very bright future. Colm Bourke did his confidence the world of good finishing a fine 6th in the boys u-18 triple jump as did Aishan Patil in the u-17 boys 1,500m where he too finished in 6th.
There was time for two more fine performances from Sligo athletes with first Sharon Hodgins running the most perfect race only to be pipped for 2nd place by a mere 0.2 of a second and had to settle for 4th place in a blanket finish - she held 2nd all the way up the straight until being pipped on the line. This is Sharons first indoor race so will learn so much from this. Then Killian O'Connor (pictured no.464) nearly pulled off the perfect run when he lead the boys u-19 1,500m all the way through the race, winding it up every lap and going out onto the final lap had kicked well clear, homing in on his first National title. However with 100m to go a Metro St Brigets athlete got onto his shoulder and out scrapped the gutsy O'Connor. But still a great performance and Killian came away with a brilliant silver medal.
Well done to all Sligo AC athletes and best of luck to all taking part in the second part of the National indoor programme in 2 weeks time in Nenagh.