It was worth the long wait until the final session for an Irish athlete to strike gold at the of European Indoor Championships in the Netherlands. And it was not just gold with Kate O’Connor and Mark English also landing bronze medals in their respective disciplines.
Sarah Healy came to Apeldoorn with a reputation of not producing her best at major championships. But in less than nine minutes yesterday, the 24-year-old Dubliner ran the perfectly judged race to land gold in the 3000m.
Healy was always in the right position and looked in control as she went through the bell in third place.
She ran wide on the last back straight to move up to the shoulder of Melissa Courtney-Bryant before coming off the bend and cruising past the Briton to win in 8:52.92.
She becomes the first Irish woman to win gold at the event.
“It was amazing… the best part is that my parents are here because they have seen me so sad so many times,” said Healy.
“I knew I had an opportunity today to win a medal, and to win gold, but I didn’t want to put too much expectation on it and just try to race the best I could. I knew a medal would be great. It was a messy race, I had to wait until the last 100m, but so glad it worked out.”
Less than 15 minutes earlier, Mark English had ended the six-year medal drought for the Irish at this event.
The last athlete to win a medal was no other than the Donegal man himself at the Emirates Arena in Glasgow back in 2019.
Now older and obviously wiser, just days short of his 32nd birthday, English showed all his experience with a positive move on the last lap to take the bronze medal behind the surprise winner Samuel Chapple, who set a Dutch record of 1:44.88.
English’s 1:45.46 was not his fastest this season but good enough to see him mount the podium for the third time after taking silver and bronze at earlier editions of these championships stretching back to 2014.
And the medals just kept coming for the Irish as Kate O’Connor entered the 800m, the final discipline of the heptathlon, in fourth place and needing to produce the run of her life to snatch third from Britain’s Jade O’Dowda.
And that is exactly what she did, overcoming a points difference that equated to over two seconds, a huge amount in 800 metres.
The Dundalk athlete took the proverbial bull by the horns, striking the front from the gun, and leading all the way.
After sticking grimly to the front, she came home in a 2:11.42 leaving the English woman trailing over four seconds in her wake and deprived of the bronze.
It was O’Connor’s fourth personal best in the five events, aggregating to a new national record total of 4,781 points.
Andrew Coscoran gave a decent account of himself in the 3000m but again he did not have the finishing speed to grab a place on the podium.
The Balbriggan man was in contention with two laps to go as Jakob Ingebrigtsen wound up the pace at the front, but ended up sixth in 7:51.77.
It was Ingebrigtsen’s seventh European Indoor gold, equalling the record of the USSR’s Valeriy Borzov.
Denied the services of Sharlene Mawdsley (hamstring) and Phil Healy (sick overnight), the weakened Irish quartet of Rachel McCann, Lauren Cadden, Arlene Crossan and Cliodhna Manning finished sixth as Femke Bol anchored the Netherlands to their third relay gold and seven in all.
Sarah Healy was not the only Irish winner at the championships with Orla Comerford claiming the gold medal in the 60m Para event.
Comerford was first out of the blocks and blew the field away as she raced to victory, clocking 7.63 seconds, a mere hundredth outside her personal best.
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