The 70th Cork City Sports held at MTU stadium in Bishopstown provided an extremely high standard of track and field athletics on Tuesday night with two Meeting and Stadium records and one national record. The crowd was highly involved and entertained and showed their appreciation to all the athletes including the six Irish athletes present that have been selected for the Paris Olympic Games..
The meeting opened with a meeting record by almost two meters from world ranked number three, Brooke Anderson USA, in the women’s hammer, with a throw of 73.10 eclipsing the old record of 71.19. Anderson took the title in difficult windy conditions from world ranked number two Janee Kasanavoid USA and Ireland’s Paris Olympics bound Nicola Tuttle.
The womens 100m provided a spectacular run from Celera Barnes USA in a time of 11.14 which would have equalled the twenty year old meeting record if it was not for a higher than allowed wind reading. Local hero and Bandon athlete Phil Healy was fourth in an event which is shorter than her specialist distance.
The mens 100m also produced a very fast time from Coby Hilton USA in 10.08 which would also have been a meeting record and stadium record except once again the wind reading was 0.2 meters per second above allowable levels. Irish record holder Israel Olatunde ran a season’s best to come fourth continuing to improve race by race.
The highly anticipated womens 100m hurdles saw crowd favorite Sarah Lavin take the victory from a packed race in a superb legal time of 12.83 from Talie Bonds USA and Ebony MorrissonLiberia. All three were under the 13 second barrier. Lavin who finished second in her last two appearances, finally took the win and received Athlete of the Meeting for her persistence in returning year after year despite having better financial opportunities elsewhere in Europe.
There were fantastic mens and womens 3000m races with world standard times. The women’s race was won by Taylor Werner USA in a close race with a time of 8.43.12 from Verity Ockenden GBR 8.43.87 and eighteen year old rising star Nancy Cherop Kenya 8.45.64. Werner is the fiancee of the son of two time world champion and world record holder Frank O Meara who was present at the meeting and received a warm reception from an appreciative crowd. He was part of the medal presentation party for this event.
The mens 3000m race had a very high level field producing a stadium record for the winner Olin Hacker USA in 7.40.49. This would certainly have produced a meeting record if conditions were not as windy. Hacker covered the last lap in a blistering fifty five seconds to take the win from Kasey Knevelbaard USA in 7.41.61 and a fast closing Nick Griggs IRL producing an Irish U23 record with 7.41.68.
Other notable performances on the night were produced by Torrie Lewis AUS in the women’s 200m with a legal wind time time of 23.01 beating Talitha Diggs USA with Phil Healy IRL producing a season’s best in 5th place. The mens race also saw some fast times by winner Ian Kerr BAH 20.31 from Caleb Law AUS and Mark Smyth IRL in a new PB 20.60.
The mens 800m was a race to the finish line with Josh Hoey USA battling it out with Edmund du Plessis RSA over the final fifty metres with Du Plessis taking it by the finest of margins in a new meeting record of 1.45.40. The old record was held by the great Johnny Grey and stood since 1985.
The women’s 800m had hometown interest with Louise Shanahan unusually taking a joint second place with Charne Swart RSA. The judges could not separate the two even by one thousandth of a second. The race was won by McKenna Keegan USA.
The men’s Long Jump produced superb jumping from twoCork athletes with Reece Ademola taking it from Shane Howard in the narrowest of margins 7.71 to 7.70.
The final event of the night produced a thrilling race with the crowd on their feet cheering twelve sub four minute miles. The winner was Nathan Green USA in 3.53.67 from Ireland’s Paris bound, defending champion, Cathal Doyle 3.54.48 and Sam Prackel USA 3.54.58.
