IRISH athletes continued to impress on the second day of the European Athletics U18 Championships in Banska Bystrica, Slovakia as temperatures rose to the high-20s in the SNP Dukla Stadium.
Cian Crampton from Edenderry in County Offaly picked up Ireland’s first medal of the championships. Crampton had impressed on Thursday needing only one throw to qualify for last night’s discus final and he followed that up with an Irish U18 best of 60.55m in the second round to put himself into the silver medal position.
He was overtaken by Ukraine’s Yaroslav Lystopad, who threw 60.93 in the third round, but he was to remain in third behind Poland’s Jakub Rodziak, who threw a world-leading 64.21m, and Lystostad.
Three other Irish athletes were involved in finals. Orangegrove AC’s Ben Sykes will be pleased with reaching the final of the 100m after setting a NI U18 record in winning both his heat and semi-final.
Unfortunately, he could not reproduce the 10.65 seconds clocking from the semi-final, which would have been good enough for fourth, instead having to settle for a 10.75 mark in seventh and well behind the winner, Jakob Kemminer of Germany, who stopped the clock at 10.46 seconds.
Enya Silkena was a creditable 11th in the pentathlon with a personal best 5408 points total and Savanagh O’Callaghan, whose grandfather is the well-known Donegal official Bernie O’Callaghan, was 16th in the girls’ 5000m walk recording a time of 25:50.01
Earlier, Conor Kelly was one of the first in action and the Derry Track Club athlete continued his smooth journey to the final of the 400m. Kelly was quick away when the gun fired and soon overtook the Slovenian competitor immediately outside him in lane eight.
He continued to run a strong backstraight and bend but was surprised to see the Hungarian Peter Saray a metre ahead of him as they entered the final straight. No problem for the 17-year-old who just put the foot on the gas to come home clear in 47.62.
“Having that comfort just to chill in the last 40m, being able to look over my shoulder is nice,” said Kelly. “Knowing there’s only three semis and I’m one of the guys who qualified first is nice as well but I’ll come out tomorrow to a new race.”
Kelly’s final this evening looks as though it could be one of the highlights of the championships, with all eight running under 48 seconds to qualify. The championship record of 46.67, set by David García of Spain in Jerusalem two years ago, will almost certainly be under threat.
Ethan Dewhirst looks to be following in the steps of his brother Fintan, who took a 400m hurdles silver medal in these championships two years ago, winning his opening round heat of the same event.
Dewhirst’s time of 52.65 was a personal best and second fastest of the 24 athletes who will contest the semi-finals this morning.
“I knew I had something to prove and at the moment,” said the Donegal youth. “I’m running every race like it’s a final because you really never know what’s going to happen.”
Shercock AC’s Tom Williams was well short of his European-leading 77.31m mark in the hammer but managed to progress to the final also on Saturday evening with a final throw of 67.18m. Williams had fouled both his earlier efforts and was on the verge of exiting the competition.
Joe Daly easily moved through to the semi-finals of the 200m after taking second in his heat in 21.51 seconds. Daly came into these championships as one of Ireland’s medal hopes and his podium potential was enhanced when Britain’s Jake Odey-Jordan, Europe’s fastest this year, was eliminated after easing up too early in his heat.
Other athletes to progress included Molly Daly as a non-automatic qualifier in the 200m with a 24.61 clocking; Conor Penney who cleared 2.05m in the high jump; Pia Langton and Saoirse Fitzgerald in the 800m recording 2:11.00 and 2:10.14 in their respective heats and Bobby More with a 1:52.15 personal best in boys’ 800m
Not so fortunate were Maria Zakharenko who went out at the semi-final stage of the 400m finishing seventh in 56.95 as did Orlaith Mannion in the 100m hurdles, also seventh, in 13.98.
