EUROPEAN CROSS COUNTRY: Alistair Cragg has quickly proven his outstanding athletic potential on the international stage with an eighth place finish in yesterday's European Cross Country Championships, staged in Medulin, Croatia.
It was the first time the 22-year-old Cragg was representing Ireland since switching his allegiance from South Africa earlier this year, and his first taste of such high-class international competition. By finishing eighth he has also delivered the highest Irish men's placing in the nine editions of the championships.
More significantly, Cragg was in contention for an individual medal throughout the 9.8km race. The course was bone dry but hit by a strong coastal gale, and Cragg, who is very lightly built even by distance running standards, appeared to have some problems with the wind in the closing few hundred metres.
Still, only 15 seconds separated him from the powerfully built winner Sergiy Lebid of the Ukraine (clocking 28 minutes, 58 seconds), the defending European champion who collected his third title in all.
Mustapha Essaid of France and Fabian Roncero of Spain, both highly experienced at the top level of cross county, took silver and bronze respectively.
Before yesterday, Cragg's experience had been limited to US collegiate competition, where he represents the University of Arkansas. Yet at no point did he appear daunted by such a step up in competition, and was actually pressing the pace at the front for the first three of the eight laps.
Seamus Power also put himself at the very front for the opening few laps, but unfortunately paid the price in the latter stages and ended up in 32nd place. Fiachra Lombard came through to be the second-best Irish finisher in 26th place, but with the fourth man, Gareth Turnbull, back in 37th place the team medals on this occasion were well out of reach.
Two years ago in Sweden the Irish team managed bronze medals, and the encouraging starts by both Cragg and Power meant that after three laps the team was once again in third. The race, however, remained deceptively fast until the finish with Spain, France and Portugal eventually filling the top three, and Ireland ending up sixth of the 13 finishing teams.
Though admitting he was "extremely nervous" before the race, Cragg has now underlined his clear potential as Ireland's newest hope in distance running. Having held an Irish passport since he was 10, and with Irish grandparents on his mother's side, he has also made it clear how passionate he feels about running in the green vest.
For Anne Keenan-Buckley the green vest still remains a great source of inspiration, and once again the 40-year-old was the leading Irish finisher in the women's race, eventually taking a very creditable 18th place. Like the men, however, the team fell back as the race progressed, and in the end also took sixth place behind medallists Russia, Portugal and Britain.
Slovenia produced the unlikeliest of champions in 36-year-old Helena Javornik, who was also well built to suit the conditions. Both Valerie Vaughan and Sinead Delahunty-Evans showed plenty of enthusiasm in the early laps, and took 39th and 47th place respectively, but it was Breda Dennehy who perhaps ran the smartest to come through for 29th place.
Only two Irish runners contested the junior races, with Dublin's Colm Rooney performing well to take 17th in the junior men. Fionnula Britton from Wicklow found things a little harder in the junior women, taking 49th place.
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