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A game of thumbs, a sport of moments … and there have never been any one like that for Irish Athletics.
A moment born of long years of anonymous labor, a perfect storm of talent and perseverance, of self-control under foul pressure, a bloated barrage of emotions that ends up bursting for four glowing young athletes in green .
Patience Jumbo-Gula cried, Ciara Neville screamed, Molly Scott jumped and Gina Akpe-Moses ran, as fast as she had done in the race, to kiss her teammates after the Women's 4x100m final at the U-20 World Championships, their second place in 43.90 netting the first outdoor championship relay medal in the history of Irish athletics.
For all the talents of the team, look at an athlete who could have the brightest future of all, Rhasidat Adeleke, aged 15, who played a leading role for them. bring but is injured. 19659004] "I felt good for the first 70 meters, but then I said to myself" oh my god, "said Adeleke, who felt her hamstrings contract and start giving in the middle of his semifinal .
"I just thought," I have to give this baton to Patience otherwise they will hate me all. "I would hate myself."
That she did, pbading to one of her best friends in the sport, Jumbo-Gula, 16-year-old sprint star, who won the race in 44.27 Friday.
The Jamaicans and Americans having botched their sticks, the Irish qualified for the final as the second best qualifying time, with an opportunity unlike anything they had before.
On the surface, the 4x100m seems a relatively simple race: a test of raw speed and the ability to cope with nervous pressure. In both departments, the Irish had been well trained.
Four months earlier, they found themselves in a training camp in Portugal, sharing their exchanges with Karen Kirk, the relay coach of Athletics Ireland, who sent them back to their home country. individual coaches knowing that they were in good hands to build the most. crucial element: speed.
They have met several times since, and as pressure increased in the hall last Saturday, a few minutes before the final, Ciara Neville reminded his teammates not to weigh too much the weight of l & # 39; occasion.
"Imagine we are in Oordegem," she said, referring to a quiet race in Belgium where she broke the Irish U-20 record in May.
Molly Scott ran the 100-meter hurdles semifinal two hours earlier, and after losing 13.94, she was warned by her mother and coach Deirdre to take the lead in the game.
"She gave me 20 minutes, then told me cop, forget about it," Scott said. "You just have to take it out of your mind."
In the hall of call, as rival teams hugged and worried, the Irish were laid back until nonchalance.
"We did not deal with bullying games, most of the other teams shouted and slapped, we were dancing," Scott said.
"We had really positive vibrations, which we needed," said Jumbo-Gula. "We did not need to be tense, we said that when we would have the stick, we would run."
They had already been in this situation, but at a lower level, and have seen their dreams evaporate.
At the 2015 European Youth Games, Akpe-Moses was torn hamstring and failed to finish at the U-20 European Championships. last year they finished out of the medals after bad changes.
Even here their exchanges were far from perfect, especially the third, with Jumbo-Gula taking Neville's wand in fourth place.
The 16-year-old Dundalk man rose to second place in seconds, then began to think of gold.
Huge
"I was trying so hard to catch the young German girl, but she ran away," Jumbo-Gula said. "But I'm glad we're second, it's a huge feat."
They crossed the finish line in a U-20 national record of 43.90, at 0.08 behind Germany – about a quarter of the time
The following hours pbaded in a haze of light. dazzled incredulity, and each of them had to put his phone on standby to stop the torrent of messages.
In a sport that occurs only occasionally in the mainstream, they knew that the aftershocks could be pbaded on for years. A silver medal in a sprint event at a championship with 150 nations, in a sport with a global reach competing only with football – that was great.
The reasons for this breakthrough are clear: a great improvement in the coaches' expertise over the last decade, a golden crop of sprinting talent, and the high performance program for younger and younger people performance of Athletics Ireland.
But at the same time, it was a medal won by athletes who operate on a minimal budget, the hope now being that those who hold such power have the foresight to invest heavily in their future, because it's a generation too special "
" We make a name for ourselves in the most positive way, "said Akpe-Moses. "We come for everyone."
Irish Independent
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