Kickstarting her indoor season with a first place finish, Ciara Mageean clearly means business for 2022.
Clocking 8:47.23 in the 3,000m at the Manchester World Indoor Tour meet, the New Balance athlete achieved a PB by an entire second and inched closer to the Irish record in the process.
Video now up of the World Indoor Tour silver meeting in Manchester where Ciara Mageean set a 3000m PB of 8:47.24 - flying last lap.
Sarah Healy ran with her to the bell but miscounted laps - would have smashed the Irish U23 record (9:04) but for that.https://t.co/Z5YKJpYZ4v pic.twitter.com/qvYDbCvSRv— Cathal Dennehy (@Cathal_Dennehy) January 23, 2022
Outrunning Albania’s Luiza Gega in a highly competitive final lap, she now lies just three and a half seconds behind the overall national record of 8:43.74 that Mary Cullen has held since 2009.
The result also qualifies the Portaferry woman for the World Indoor Championships that are to take place in Belgrade in March.
Speaking to Athletics Weekly after the race, Mageean reflected that she is little by little closing in on the elusive goal of the Irish record.
“I wanted to get an Irish record.” @ciaramageean chats to @Jason_AW on her 3000m victory indoors in Manchester 🇮🇪#WorldIndoorTour pic.twitter.com/y8o2SB6ARP
— AW (@AthleticsWeekly) January 22, 2022
“I really wanted an Irish record but didn’t get it today,” she said.
“It’s always hard to tell what kind of shape you’re in during the first race of the season. I train here and [the organisers] have done a fantastic job putting it on.”
Teammate Sarah Healy also took part in the same event and despite being well in the mix eventually stepped off track heading into the last lap.
Elsewhere Limerick’s Sarah Lavin notched a 8:11 and second place in the 60m hurdles, while teammate Kate Doherty passed the line in 8.37.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpT2UzfzYqM
