Mark English and Rob Heffernan struggle at Cork City Sports

With the World Athletics Championships in Beijing coming swiftly down the tracks it appears both Mark English and Rob Heffernan still have some considerable catching up to do.

Both athletes came to the 64th Cork City Sports looking to regain that winning feeling, and English looked to have done that as he moved to the front of the 800 metres around the last bend, only to fade badly down the home stretch, ending up a tired-looking third.

Michael Rutt from the US took the win in 1:47.57, with Andreas Bube from Denmark also getting past English, who looked badly winded when finishing third in 1:47.89 – some way off his best of 1:44.84.

The Donegal athlete had struggled a little in his last couple of races over the distance, and came to Cork in the mood for fast running. “I’m not going to jump to any conclusions,” he said. “It wasn’t about tactics, I just didn’t feel great, and it’s just about getting back into that zone now.”

With the 800m qualifying time for Beijing already in the bag, English now moves straight on to Tallinn, Estonia for the European Under-23 Championships, where he will seek to add a gold medal to silver won earlier this year at the European Indoors in Prague, and also the bronze medal won at the European outdoor championships in Zurich last summer.

For Heffernan, the meeting’s main attraction, the 5km walk on the track is considerably shorter than what he’s used to, although as he gears up to defend his World 50km title in Beijing, there is still some work to do.

Indeed Heffernan found himself trailed off with 2km remaining, as Lebogang Shange from South Africa pressed ahead to take the win in 18:56.84, ahead of Alberto Amezcua from Spain, with Ireland’s Alex Wright, who trains with Heffernan, taking third in 19:00.15. Heffernan finished fourth in 19:14.00, yet declared himself reasonably satisfied with his effort, particularly given he’s not long back from groin surgery.

“I know where I’m coming from, not long after surgery, and I’d definitely happy with my time,” said Heffernan, who has just under eight weeks to prepare to defend that World title won in Moscow in 2013. “That’s actually my third fastest ever, over 5k. It’s always disappointing to be beaten, but I’m in the middle of a very heavy block of training, and I’m off in the morning now, for one-month of altitude training, in Morocco.”