Lally and Treacy head the Galway roll of honour at juvenile indoors
THE All Ireland Juvenile Indoors took place last weekend over two days in the Athlone IT arena and there were some superb performances by Galway athletes.
Alanna Lally was the top GCH performer at the All-Ireland indoors at the weekend. She had a fine double win, claiming victory in the 400m in a Championship best performance of 56.75 seconds in the under 19 girls 400m on Saturday, followed up with an 800m final victory on Sunday.
Maebh Brannigan of GCH also had a fine run in the under 18 girls 800m, winning a silver medal behind Louise Shanahan of Leevale. On Saturday, she finished 4th in the 400m. Cillin Greene, GCH, ran a terrific 200m in the under 17 boys, picking up silver in a time of 23.11 seconds.
Clubmate James Fleming also produced a splendid performance, winning a bronze medal in the under 19 boys 60m hurdles. Other strong GCH showings came from Elisabeth Maher, who reached the final of the 400m, Sarah McDonnell, who ran a PB in the under 16 girls 800m in a time of 2.21 to finish 4th, and Aoife Sheehy and Laura Nally who both made the under 15 girls 800m final.
Robert Meagher made the final of both the 200m & 400m under 19, while Samuel Samson qualified for the under 18 boys 400m final. Luke O'Shaughnessy made the under 16 boys 60m final, with Zoe Moore also featuring in the line up for the under 13 girls 60m hurdles final.
Athenry athletes Brandon Lee took the gold medal in the U14 hurdles and bronze in the 800m, while Lydia Doyle took silver in both the U15 60m sprint and hurdles.
There was a fine performance by Veronica Burke of Ballinasloe & District AC who won a silver medal in the U19 1500m Walk. Craughwell AC's stars of the action were Sineád Treacy, who won her first National title with gold in the U18 200m and Aisling Keady-Cummins, who captured the U16 high jump on her return to competitive action after an 18-month absence due to injury.
It was an unbelievable weekend for Sineád Treacy who, on Saturday, took silver in the U18 60m with a new personal best time of 7.74s. Sineád followed this up with a silver medal in the U18 long jump on Sunday in an indoor PB of 5.28m and shortly afterwards had a stunning victory in the U18 200m in an elite time of 24.73 – just one-tenth of a second short of breaking the national record in that age group and also qualifying Sineád for selection for the European Youth Olympic Trials in May.
For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.