Home Sport Athletics Laois athletes excel on the international stage in both Poland and Germany

Laois athletes excel on the international stage in both Poland and Germany

Saragh Buggy Ruby Millet Jack Fenlon

Ruby Millet and Saragh Buggy had excellent performances at the European Team Championships held in Silesia, Poland last week.

Team Ireland were competing in Division 3 of the Championships with Ireland hoping to secure promotion back up to Division 2.

Overall Team Ireland had 44 athletes competing across the 3 day competition and the St Abban’s duo excelled.

Saragh was in action on Wednesday where a jump of 13.01m secured her third place overall in the Women’s Triple Jump.

Saragh’s jump saw her gather 13 points overall and helped the team progress into a strong position on Day 1 of the competition.

With 7 victories on Day 1 along with 4 top 3 placings the Ireland team had put themselves in 1st overall with a 7 point lead going into Day 2. Ruby was in action on Day 3 in the Women’s Long jump.

Ruby made a strong start in the competition and saw herself in the lead after 3 jumps. As the final 8 athletes took their final 3 jumps, Ruby upped her performance jumping to 6.33m to take victory and maximum points for Team Ireland.

With plenty more strong performances, including 10 top 3 placings by Team Ireland on the final day they claimed victory amassing a huge total of 494 points to finish ahead of Austria and Israel.

This secures Ireland promotion back up to Division 2 where they will compete next year. Well done to Ruby, Saragh and their coach Eoin Kelly who was jumps coach with the Ireland team throughout the competition.

Meanwhile, Jack Fenlon travelled as part of an Irish Junior team to Mannheim, Germany over the weekend to compete over 3000m.

There were over 500 athletes competing from 24 nations throughout the weekend. The race itself started slowly as athletes worked out positions in the early stages. The race began to heat up as the lads made their way through the first and with 1km left there were 5 athletes that appeared still in contention.

At 800m to go there was a huge injection which the St Abban’s athlete followed along with two other athletes.

Jack appeared to judge his effort well as he led into the home straight but was just caught by another athlete with 80m to go.

Jack finished in 2nd place in 8:30. This will serve as a good experience for Jack and should set him up for championship racing as the summer progresses.

22 June 2023; Ruby Millet of Ireland in action in the womens long jump at the Silesian Stadium during the European Games 2023 in Chorzow, Poland. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

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