Hazelwood Athletes Cut a Dash on National Athletics Stage
The Munster Schools Combined Events Championship were held in the Nenagh Indoor Athletics Stadium on Wednesday last the October 16th. Hazelwood College had 4 representatives competing in the event. Eimear Lenihan competed in the Junior Girls’ Competition. She had a solid run over the hurdles and jumped personal bests in the long jump 4.47m and high jump 1.30m. Going into the final 2 events, Eimear was still outside qualification. But she really shone in the last 2 events, winning the shot putt with a throw of 9.79 m and winning the 800m with a 100m gap from second place in a time of 2min 30sec, to clinch fourth place and qualify for the national finals.
Kevin O Leary got off to a magnificent start in the Junior Boys’ Competition with his hurdles, finishing in a personal best time, just getting piped at the line for second place. He went on to set personal bests in all of the 5 events jumping 4.56m in the long jump, throwing 6.90m and running 28 seconds in the 200m. However, his biggest improvement was in the final event, the 800m, taking 20seconds off his time to come fourth. In a very competitive field, with almost 40 athletes from across Munster competing, Kevin did fantastic to come in in fourteenth place overall.
We had two girls competing in the Inter-Girls’ Competition, Allison Healy and Laoise Bennis. Both girls competed superbly, having solid runs over the hurdles to come fourth and third respectively. Both girls jumped personal bests in the long jump, Allison jumping 4.22m and Laoise Jumping 4.20m. Laoise then went on to win the high jump with a jump of 1.50m on her first attempt. Both girls had impressive throws in the shot putt and both finished strong in the 800m with personal bests in each event. By the end of the day their hard work earned them enough points for Laoise to get third place and Allison fourth place. This guaranteed them qualification for the National Finals in Athlone IT Indoor Stadium on the November 16th.
It is worth noting that the 2 girls are the first girls to ever qualify for the Schools Multi-Events Finals from Hazelwood College, considering this along with all the other fantastic performances so early in the year, 2014 looks to be a good year for Hazelwood College Athletics.
