Athletics 2024 (Mod note #869)

F me. That women's 4x4. And the OG, Phil Healy. What a time to rediscover her form. Of all that she's been through. Absolutely deserves the high to deliver an Irish 4x4 to a final.

Unreal. Herself and Chris O'Donnell are close. I'd say once one of them was going to come back out, the other was likely to join in.

Pity Barr couldn't have come out for Doggett.

The Dutch very lucky to sneak through there. Just squeezed in ahead of the Norwegians and they wouldn't have got a fastest loser place. Czechs dropped the baton in their heat as well, the Dutch might have been gone but for that too.

Be hard to judge if that's true or not. She's incredibly strong from a 4 Hurdles background so doesn't tend to blow up in the 4x4. But she's remarkably consistent in the 400 individual. You could definitely call this her breakout season. Becker too.

It's an incredibly strong team. To have someone of the of the quality of Phil Healy be only your fourth ranked team member is really something.

She certainly has the patience and temperament for it. Incredibly strong.

Adeleke confirmed as back in for tomorrow night. Ireland v Netherlands round 2 coming up then…though the Dutch did finish third in the two horse race last time. And Bol still has to run the 400m hurdles final tonight, while our team can rest up now.

Just turned it on in time for the end of coverage 🙄

Did I hear correctly that the 4x400 girls were the fastest qualifiers? Bloody hell!!

Yes, fastest even without Adeleke, though only fair to point out that others were rested also and the Dutch rested two (and almost didn't qualify as a result).

Biggest issue tomorrow might be Mawdsley's legs, five 400s in six days is a lot to ask of her.

On the men's 4x400, that was a solid enough performance. Jack Raftery was disappointing on the opening leg. 46.6x just doesn't cut it at this level. He seems to have stagnated since 2022. Chris O'Donnell ran a great second leg to bring us back into a Q spot. It really wasn't fair to drop Sean Doggett into that cauldron. He's only 17/18 and clearly not ready for that level just yet. The big positive was 21-year old Callum Baird on the anchor leg. He's lowered his individual PB to 46.19 this season and just dropped a 45.14 anchor leg. That's a great time; he looks ready for mixed relay pool in Paris, possibly ahead of Raftery or Greene.

Good performance from the women's team, just 0.5 seconds outside the NR without Adeleke. Sophie Becker ran a decent 51.6 opener. Phil Healy consolidated with a 51.3 second leg. Lauren Cadden did well to run a 52.1 third leg. Her recently set PB is 52.87. That's as much as she can deliver right now. She's still pretty young and this is her first season running 400s. I think she'll really start asserting herself next season. Mawdsley was a revelation yet again on the anchor leg. Another 49.7 leg is incredible. As others have said though, I'm really concerned about her workload. She's a warrior, but they are expecting too much from her. You can see in her face that she's tired and it clearly was to the detriment of her individual performance in the final. She may have to be selfish when Paris rolls around and say "no" to some relay legs if she is to have an outside shot at the Olympic final.

Give me five minutes and I'll change my mind again but I think the races are only benefiting her. It's been mentioned that she's with the Dutch a lot in Pappendal (semi-related reasons for being there). And Bol absolutely races a lot.

Without a doubt, there's going to be scheduling conflicts in Paris but another 400m at this stage will be a very good training run.

I know why she trains a lot in Pappendal. It’s clearly great for her, but we desperately need her at her best. Paris is where it counts. I just hope she isn’t being over-extended.

Jesus, you'd hope so!

It literally is a boy amongst men, Sean Doggett is only 17, he wont be 18 for another 6 months!!