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Monday, April 23, 2012

Success of Ireland's Marathon Mission...

There can be no doubting the success of the Ireland's Marathon Mission. Set up just two years ago at the start of 2010, it has transformed the elite Irish Marathon running scene. Four years ago in 2008, Martin Fagan was the only Irish athlete to reach the 'A' standard of 2:15 for the Beijing Olympics when he ran 2:14:06 in the Dubai Marathon. No woman reached the 'A' standard then.

Fast forward to 2012 and Mark Kenneally has already qualified for the London Olympics with a time of 2:13:55 which he set in the Amsterdam Marathon last October. It remains to be seen if any more men will join him but several others have come closer to the 'A' standard than in previous years.

For the Irish women, the Marathon Mission has had a huge impact with four now having run faster than the 'A' standard of 2:37 with more possibly to come.

The Irish Indepent have an interesting article about the Marathon Mission HERE. It details how it was set up and how it operates.
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4 comments:

  1. Anonymous24/4/12 9:55 am

    the marathon mission is a start but there is a long way to go. on the womens side it has been a sucess but the mens results haven't been what one would hope for. we only have one qualifier for the male olympic marathon event and that is probably all we will get. as jerry kiernan said before a sub 2.15 should be very manageable for a long distance runner. during the london marathon a british runner was gutted he ran 2.14 but not the 2.12 olympic standard. 150 kenyan runners have meet the qualifying standard. puts it in perspective. hope the marathon mission will contiunue and pay off. i think tho for many top notch club runners it is simply too much ahrd work. running 150 miles a week etc etc is probably not appealing

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  2. Anonymous24/4/12 1:01 pm

    correction in the above post. the olympic standard is sub 215 the british stanard is 2.12

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  3. Anonymous25/4/12 6:31 pm

    150 Miles per week is an extreme volume of training.


    Maybe these not "ahrd" people value their health.

    I have heard of an former international rugby player who has difficulty walking.

    The reason there is a 150 people in Kenya doing sub 2:15 is that Kenya is an extremely poor country with a GDP per person of 882 Euro per person. Ireland has one thirty to forty times that. Running is one of the best ways out of poverty. Puts a prize fund of 10,000 Euro in perspective.

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  4. Anonymous26/4/12 1:15 pm

    150 miles is extreme alright but the reality is that is what top marathon runners are putting in week in week out. as stated i hope the marathon mission pays off

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