Irish women's relay team win Silver at World U-20 Championships

The Irish women's 4x100m relay team won silver at the World U-20 Championships in Tampere, Finland today. The team of  Molly Scott, Gina Akpe-Moses, Ciara Neville and Patience Jumbo-Gula ran a national under-20 record time of 43.90 to finish behind Germany and in front of Great Britain to take Silver.

In the video below, the Irish team are in lane 5.

SILVER! 🥈
They’ve only gone and done it! Fantastic run in the 4x100 relay. 43.90 for @RunMollyRun13, @GinaAkpeMoses, @ciara_nev100 and @Patience_Jumbo.
Incredible pace from Patience at the end!
What a team, what a day! 🇮🇪 #HerSport #HerAthletics https://t.co/CHGnfM7f9V pic.twitter.com/HWlCaNt1o1

— HerSport (@HerSportDotIE) July 14, 2018

Irish U20 Women's Relay Team set new National Record

The Irish under 20 women's relay team set a new junior record in the 4 x 100m at the Lausanne Diamond League on Thursday the 6th of July 2017.

The Irish team of Molly Scott, Sharlene Mawdsley, Gina Akpe-Moses and Ciara Neville ran in lane 1 and finished in an impressive 6th place, pretty amazing when you consider that they are all under 20 years old.

The new Irish U20 record of 44.31s was about 0.7 seconds faster than the old record of  45.08s.



The race video is shown below. Look for the Irish quartet in lane 1...Molly Scott (SLOT), Sharlene Mawdsley (Newport), Gina Akpe Moses (Blackrock Louth) and Ciara Neville (Emerald).



The Irish women's 4x100m team are in action again at the European U20 Athletics Championships in Grosseto, Italy in two weeks time (July 20th-23rd).

Links...
1) Full results

15 Year Old Ciara Neville wins Gold for Ireland in 100m sprint

Back in February of 2015, 15 year old Ciara Neville of Emerald AC in Limerick caused an upset when she won a Silver medal in the Senior womens race in the Irish National Indoor Championships.

This week, she was part of the Irish team at the European Youth Olympic Festival in Tbilisi, Georgia. On Monday, Ciara won her heat and semi-final in the Girls 100m with times of 11.90 and 11.92 seconds respectively. On Tuesday, she won the final in 12.01 seconds to take Gold for Ireland.

Race video. Ciara is in lane 6.


Medal ceremony...

15 year old Irish sprinters Ciara Neville & Molly Scott take top 2 places at English Athletics Championships

Last weekend, 15 year old Ciara Neville of Emerald AC caused a but of an upset when she took silver in the senior womens 60m race at the Irish Indoor Championships in Athlone.

Today Saturday the 28th of February, she was in action again but this time at the English U17 Age Group Championships. Obviously this was going to be a completely different affair as Ciara was going head to head with some of the best up and coming talent in England.

In the first semi-final of the 60m, Ciara finished first in 7.57 seconds (2nd 7.64 and 3rd 7.73). In the 3rd semi-final, Molly Scott of St.Laurence O'Toole AC in Carlow finished first in 7.61s (2nd 7.66 and 3rd 7.81). This I belive was a new PB as her previous best was 7.79s set on the 10th of January this year.

In the final, Ciara won the race in a time of 7.56 seconds while Molly finished 2nd in 7.58s (3rd athlete was 7.58s as well).

Considering that both are just 15 years old, would have been going up against 16 year olds and some of the best sprinters in England in that race,  then it's a remarkable result.

Highlights of the Irish Indoor Championships...Sun 22nd Feb 2015

One of the main events on the Irish Athletics calendar is the National Indoor Championships in February every year. This is supposed to be one of the highlights of Irish Athletics but the turnout in some events was pretty abysmal.

I had a look on Saturday evening at the results and noticed just two women listed in the womens 3000m. Fair enough I though, the results aren't complete yet. However, that was the actual result!

1 MCCAMBRIDGE Maria    Dundrum South Dublin A.C.    9:26.77   
2 MOORE Niamh        U.C.C. A.C.        10:43.53

Just to clarify. A member of any club could have run in this at 10 minute mile pace and got a bronze national medal.

The full results can be found HERE , just click on the event. RTE have 51 minutes of highlights on their RTE Player Service HERE

One of the most interesting and biggest suprises of the championships was the performance of 15 year old Ciara Neville of Emerald AC in Limerick. In the womens 60m hurdles, she finished second in a time which put her 12th on the Irish All Time list. You can see that race in the coverage at 13:40.

1 MCMANUS Catherine    Dublin City Harriers A.C.    8.44   
2 NEVILLE Ciara        Emerald A.C.        8.71   
3 DAWKINS Shannen    St. Joseph's A.C.        9.14   
4 FUSSEY Niamh        St Peters        9.83   

Ciara Neville of Emerald AC...#108, Kelly Proper #44 & Phil Healy #88

In the senior womens 60m race, Ciara Neville finished second again but this time, she finished ahead of the likes of Phil Healy and Catherine McManus who were part of the 4x100m Irish relay team that went to the European Championships last year.

1 PROPER Kelly        Ferrybank A.C.        7.38   
2 NEVILLE Ciara        Emerald A.C.        7.46   
3 MCMANUS Catherine    Dublin City Harriers A.C.    7.50   
4 HEALY Phil        Bandon A.C.        7.51   
5 MANNING Cliodhna    Kilkenny City Harriers A.C.    7.53   
6 BRADY Claire        Celbridge A.C.        7.55   
7 MURRAY Sarah        Fingallians A.C.        7.60   
8 FORKAN Aishling    Swinford A.C.        7.72

Pretty amazing for a 15 year old. What will she be running when she's 20? That time of 7.46s by the way puts her straight in at joint 10th on the Irish All Time list.

Coverage of the womens 60m race starts at about 31:30 in the highlights.