Tipperary athlete achieves European U-18 qualifying time

Tullamore was the setting for last Saturday’s Leinster Juvenile Track and Field Championships.

The organisers kindly provided Sam O’Sullivan with a 10,000 metres walk event as he pursued the qualifying time for the upcoming European Under 18 track and field championships, which will be held in Jerusalem in July.

Sam’s challenge was great with a qualification standard of 48 minutes set by Athletics Ireland. Sam was ably assisted by Joe Mooney from Adamstown AC. Joe, a senior athlete, took Sam out at pace going through the halfway mark at 24 mins 15 secs. Sam put in some hard kilometres from 6 to 8 having slipped off the pace at the 8km mark.

This allowed Sam a mere 9 minutes to do the last two kilometres and was the point in the race where Sam’s training came to the fore. He dug deep, walking his final two kilometres in 8 mins 50 secs and a massive PB improvement of 67 seconds to finish just inside the mark in 47 mins 50 secs.