Future stars run for glory

Modern sport may be just about squeezed of all innocence, but there will always be innocence at the Community Games. All across the wide and colourful plains of Mosney yesterday, kids starry-eyed and laughing renewed the faith.

It is said quite rightly that they are the future of Irish sport, and yet for each one of them, the only future was now. This was the annual pilgrimage north of Dublin for National Finals, a hectic double-weekend that brought together young sporting talents from small towns and communities across the country.

Whittled down from tens of thousands over the last few months, these were the ones who had earned the right to represent their county. While mothers cried and fathers roared, young runners and swimmers took to their lanes, teams of eager hurlers and footballers took to the field, and all of them battled for gold. From badminton to volleyball, no talent was left uncovered. No skill was left unchartered.

An afternoon wandering between the various events, all carefully laid out and orchestrated like a mini-Olympic village, is one sure way to feel good about the future. Any one of these youngsters could be the next Sonia O'Sullivan, Eamonn Coghlan or Niall Quinn - just some of the Irish sporting champions who began their careers on these same nurturing beds.

Much of the focus yesterday fell on the grandstand track and field. It may have been grass rather than mondo but there is no better surface for running barefoot in the breeze. Off to the side, the medal ceremony runs non-stop and among the smiling faces is Claire McNamara, Galway's under-14 winner of the 80 metre hurdles. Like most events here, the previous winners include an Olympian, in this case Sydney-bound Susan Smith-Walsh.

And like Sydney, the competition is intense - for most of the kids, anyway. Awaiting their event, they limbered up like seasoned professionals, as the parents hold water bottles and talk tactics. They checked their ESB-sponsored numbers and told them who to watch but once the gun goes off, it's pure instinct for them.

The organisation is magical, and no sooner had one race finished than the next one had started. A mad roar signalled the end of the under-17 final over 100 metres and Louth's Kieran McCormack allowed himself a winning pose. Fastest man at the Games and definitely has a future.

Even the very youngest display the sort of potential that foreign coaches would probably steal for. Darragh O Conaill had a five-metre lead coming off the bend of the 200 metres under-10 final and still full of running at the finish, he added to Kerry's winning weekend.

But the depth and range of talent was quite phenomenal. Six hundred metres is a long way to sprint if you're under-12 and yet Waterford's David McCarthy bounced around from start to finish like he was born to run. Our middle-distance tradition looks secure.

William Harty has already made his talents known in schools' events during the last couple of years but he was back in Mosney yesterday to defend the under-17 marathon title that he won ahead of his older rivals last year. Now time, of course, is not important at events like this but it was some two minutes before the second placed runner followed the Waterford runner home. He must have somehow got some of John Treacy's blood into him.

Inside in the ballroom, there's a basketball final to relish and by pure coincidence it's another Kerry victory - the girls under-16 title. But it's not all limited to the energetic. Already there have been medals for chess and pitch and putt, for art and for choir singing.

Running the show may sound like a logistical nightmare, but if Dublin does ever get to host the Olympics, this would be the ideal place to start recruiting the officials.

Of course, not all these youngsters will go on to bigger and better things. Some will develop faster than others, and some won't develop at all. But just two years ago, Martina McCarthy was with the Galway squad in Mosney, Right now, she is in Sydney preparing for the 4 x 400 metre relay.

But at least all of them can look back and remember a time when running meant putting one foot in front of the other as fast as you could. Sport wouldn't survive without events like this and events like this don't come any better than the Community Games.