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©INPHO/Presseye/Darren Kidd
Road to London

O'Rourke wins national indoor title, but promises improvement

Derval O’Rourke won the 60m hurdles at the Senior Indoor Track and Field Championships in a time of 8.21s yesterday.

DERVAL O’ROURKE continued her Olympic preparations with a win in the 60m hurdles at the Senior Indoor Track and Field Championships yesterday, but admitted afterwards that there is still plenty of room for improvement.

O’Rourke won her heat in 8.23 seconds, before shaving 0.02 off that time in the final to take gold ahead of Sarah Lavin (8.46s) and Lily Ann O’Hora (8.68s).

“I am happy to have won,” O’Rourke said afterwards. “My times are not so great but technically I am getting better, I just need to be more aggressive over the hurdles.”

Athlete of the Meet Ben Reynolds won the men’s 60m hurdle title, but fell agonisingly short of the qualification standard for next month’s World Indoor Championships. Reynolds set a new U23 record with his winning time of 7.75 seconds, one-hundredth of a second too slow to guarantee him a place at the starting line in Istanbul.

“I will make one last try for the time in Belgium next weekend,” the 21-year old told BBC Sport. ”But I was pleased with today. I’m getting faster with every race.”

In the men’s 1500m, Letterkenny AC’s Daniel Mooney led home an Ulster 1-2-3, winning in 3.52.83 ahead of club-mate Ruairi Finnegan (3.54.84) and Conor Bradley (3.55.84).

Senior Men’s  1,500m final winner Daniel Mooney of Letterkenny AC. Pic: INPHO/Presseye/Darren Kidd

Orla Drumm won the women’s 1500m in 4.20.54, while there were also senior indoor titles for Seye Ogunlewe in the men’s 60m, Amy Foster in the women’s 60m, 17-year-old Marcus Lawler in the men’s 200m and Steffi Creaner in the women’s 200m.

Olympic hopeful Robert Heffernan was the highlight of day one of this year’s championships. The Togher AC man won the men’s 5k walk in a time of 19.06.58 on Saturday, coming home almost half a minute ahead of West Waterford’s Jamie Costin (19.35.06) and Tara AC’s Michael Doyle (19.50.52).

At the USA Track and Field Classic on Saturday night, Ciarán Ó Lionáird recorded a personal best of 3.54.08 to finish sixth in the mile, won by world outdoor 1500m silver medallist Silas Kiplagat of Kenya in 3.52.63. Ó Lionáird’s time was the eighth-fastest in the world this year.

Full results from the 2012 Woodie’s DIY Indoor Championships of Ireland are available here >