O'Donnell pipped once again for gold in Santry

Carrick AC’s Gerard O’Donnell was denied another national 110m Hurdles title by almost the skin of his teeth last Saturday as the Leitrim athlete was pipped by just one hundredth of a second in an incredibly close final.

With conditions at the 123.ie Athletics Ireland National Senior Championships challenging to say the least for sprinters, with winds gusting over five metres per second in competitors’ faces on the home straight, O’Donnell had to be content with the silver medal for the second year in a row.

Having lost by two hundredths of a second last year, Gerard got out of the blocks well before his trademarked late surge saw him start to close the gap on leader James Ezeonu of Leevale AC in Cork. The Carrick AC athlete appeared to be pulling ahead of his rival but a late lunge for the line saw Ezeonu take the title.

The Leevale athlete won in a time of 14.28 seconds to O’Donnell’s 14.49 with defending champion Matthew Behan a distant third in a time of 14.95 to complete the podium,

Speaking to Athletics Ireland’s online coverage of the championships after the race, Gerard admitted his frustration at coming slow close once again and the fact that conditions militate against better performances while also congratulating Ezeonu on his victory.

Asked if he was happy with the race, Gerard replied “No, not at all. I had two or three bad hurdles. It's a bit annoying, the wind is absolutely desperate, same as last year. Myself and James are obviously ready to run extremely fast, it would have been nice if we could have turned it around the other way and run two sub 13s.

“But that’s what we’re dealing with here. James ran class, pulled it out of the bag, a brilliant run” later joking “Sure I’m old enough to be this fellas’ father!”

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Gerard did see positives in the performance and given the conditions, believes he is in personal best shape: “I always finish strong, I actually got out pretty well but that is pretty much a season’s best in a minus four, like I am ready to be close to a PB so we’ll go on again. Get a few more races in, try and get a bit of better conditions and see how we go.”

Gerard followed up his hurdles with two strong showings over 100m on Sunday, clocking 11.18 with a minus 2.4 wind in the heats to qualify for the semi-finals. Up against Irish record holder Israel Olatunde in the semi-final, the Carrick athlete clocked 11.06, finishing third in his heat and 11th overall and the fastest non-qualifier for the final.

Good weekend on track at the National Champs. Just 0.01 away from a 7th outdoor hurdles title, and finished one place outside the 100m final.

There's always next year...@markkavo 1,2,4@SportsfileSam 3 pic.twitter.com/Z2Y1iKmn90

— Gerard O'Donnell (@Gerard_OD_) August 2, 2023

Gerard's Carrick AC clubmate Alannah McGuinness, and a member of the Dublin Sprint group where Gerard is also a coach, was  in action over the weekend in the women's 100m heats but did not advance to the semi-finals.

The Dublin Sprint group also claimed two further medals in the Women's 400m through Olympian Sophie Becker who finished second  and the Women's 400m hurdles where Deirdre Murray claimed a bronze.