DCU athletes set new records at IUAA championships

DCU blazed a record winning trail at the recent IUAA Championships (Irish University Athletics Championships) in Athlone on Friday, February 12th achieving six new indoor club records. It was a winning weekend on all fronts, as both the male and female squads retained their team titles, making it ten overall team titles for the men and a ninth successive title for the women and marks one of the best team performances for the club in the past ten years. The female jumpers of Sarah Mc Carthy (5.95m in the Long Jump) and Emily Rogers (1.70m in the High Jump) and Saragh Buggy (12.68m in the Triple Jump – new IUAA / DCU record) dominated their events. Sarah Murray was magnificent in the 60m sprint, winning in a new DCU record and personal best of 7.46s while Lilly-Ann O Hora won her first IUAA individual title with 8.71 in the 60mH. Sophie Parkinson Brown delivered two new DCU records in the weight for distance with 8.66m and the shot- putt with 12.29m. The victorious 4 x 200m relay team of Sarah Mc Carthy, Catherine Mc Manus, Katie Berney and Sarah Murray completed a great day for the ladies team. The women’s team won seventeen medals with seven gold, five silver and five bronze. In the men’s competition, there were two new IUAA and DCU records from athletes Antonio Garcia in the 60mH with 8.13s and Micheal Bowler in the combined events with 3835pts. In addition, there were victories for Conor Duncan in the 800m, Pierre Murchan in the 3000m, Colm Bourke in the long jump and James Kelly in the shot putt. The men’s squad matched the 2015 haul of 16 medals accumulating six gold, six silver and four bronze. The women’s team on 116 points were comfortably ahead of nearest rivals UL (58 points) and TCD (32 points) while the men’s team collected 108 points, ahead of UL (50 points) and QUB (32 points). Check out www.iuaa.org for a full list of all individual results.