Sonia O’Sullivan: Monaco sets scene for bigger things to come

Sometimes you don’t appreciate the good things you have until they are gone, things you once took for granted as part of what you did. Only when you get to revisit those past experiences do you begin to fully appreciate them, although in a different light.

Walking into the Stade Louis II in Monaco last Friday evening I got that exact feeling. The Monaco athletics meeting is now part of the IAAF Diamond League and, back in my competitive days, one of the biggest dates on the old Grand Prix circuit.

It was hard to believe it’s over 20 years now since I ran one of my fastest times on that track, the 3:58.85 for 1,500 metres, back in 1995, which still stands as the Irish record. Although that wasn’t the only memory revived on the night.

I also recalled my first ever run inside the stadium, just one week after finishing fourth at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, over 3,000m. This was my introduction to big time athletics, travelling around Europe from one race to the next.

On that first visit to Monaco, in 1992, I shared a room with Britain’s Sally Gunnell, who had just won the Olympic gold medal over the 400m hurdles. You can imagine what sort of experience that was.

As exhausted as I was after the Olympics, suffering from a severe lack of sleep, I managed to run my then fastest 1,500, around 4:05.1. I remember coming away wanting more chances to race and chase times before the close of season.

Monaco, and the Stade Louis II stadium, is a pretty surreal setting for an athletics meeting, especially as most of the athletes are put up in the famous Fairmont Hotel, overlooking one of the most famous hairpin bends in Formula One racing, backing on to the Mediterranean Sea.

It’s about as luxurious a setting for athletes as you can get. As an athlete you don’t always get to appreciate those surroundings, as you try to keep things simple, maintain a routine, no matter where you are. Maintaining focus and saving energy is the general rule, and there’s certainly no time to explore the local attractions.

So I took that opportunity last Friday, got my bearings, and revisited some of what I vaguely knew from my previous visits, although never truly experienced. It helps that you can now look up Google maps to see exactly how far away the stadium is: it’s actually just a short walk from the Fairmont, where also you get true view of Monaco, and with that appreciation some of the area.

So I headed off about 5:30pm. Even though I was watching from the stands, I’d been given a couple of jobs to look after for a few athletes I know, and I had to get to the stadium by around 6:30pm.

There are regular shuttle buses for the athletes to catch, and it’s also a short drive away, as you can take a short cut through the Rock, to get to the Stade Louis II. What I never before realised is that you can also walk over the rock, and get to the stadium by foot. Before I set off I grabbed a quick coffee, not very different to what I used to do before catching the bus to the stadium in the 90s. Some things never change.

The first event was the long jump, and I’d agreed to take a unique position in the stand, right opposite the long jump, to help Australian jumper Fabrice Lapierre get his mark right on the runway, so that he could get the cleanest possible jump.

Only on the first two jumps he got the red flag. I was worried my inexperience and judgment was lacking and my hand signals were being misread, but thankfully Fabrice got in a jump on his final attempt.

With three more jumps he was able to grab second place, and enough points to leave him leading the Diamond League race with five more events to go. As a World Championship silver medallist, Fabrice is definitely one of the athletes to watch in Rio.

Next up were the middle distance races, and unlike at the major championships, there was a quick pace set from the start in the men’s 1500m and women’s 3000m. It’s always interesting to see the difference in tactics used by athletes when they run in championship races as it is rarely seen practised in other races.

It’s good to build confidence knowing you can run a fast time but also important to know what to do when a race starts out slowly, and boils down to a superfast finish, which is typical of what you will get at the Olympics in a few weeks’ time. From that point of view, it’s been a little bit surprising to note the lack of Irish athletes at these meetings, because there is no replacing the sort of race experience that comes with them.

Still, there have actually been very few races this year where all the main contenders for Rio have lined up. It is a difficult year for all the athletes to race regularly, as most will be focused on the Olympics, just over two weeks away.

Even with all the talk about the Russian athletes being absent from Rio, the one race that has been producing consistent results is the women’s 800m: and whatever about the problem of doping, the one issue that’s certain to come up in Rio surrounds intersex athletes, and their continuing dominance in this event.

Once again Caster Semenya led the charge, and finished with the fastest women’s 800m time for eight years with her 1:55.33. She will be very hard to beat in Rio, and her results hard to accept too, without raising eyebrows and wondering about the validity of it all.

In the meantime, most of the American athletes have been focused on their Olympic trials, while the European Championships took place in Amsterdam. All that is left now is for all the continents to finally meet up in Rio, chase that spot in the final, and begin the hunt for the ultimate prize of an Olympic medal.