Some of Ireland’s leading young athletes are being forced to travel for hours on public transport and miss lectures in college due to a lack of suitable training facilities in Dublin.
The throwing circle at Morton Stadium in Santry is currently out of use and it appears there are no plans to fix it, forcing some DCU athletics scholarship students into the long trek to training.
Hammer thrower Michaela Walsh moved to the capital from her native Mayo to take up a scholarship in DCU and it does mean that she is closer to Ireland’s top coaches in her event, and state-of-the-art training facilities on campus.
She had access to a throwing circle in her home town Swinford, but with Santry currently beyond use due to a crack in the circle’s surface, she has to journey to County Meath to throw.
"It’s really hard," said the 20-year-old Walsh, who is studying physical education and biology.
"Over the winter it affected my training because we had nowhere to train in Dublin. For me to train I had to go out to Dunboyne, which means getting two trains and a bus out. Then I have to try to balance that with trying to go to lectures and it’s basically impossible.
"At home I would have said it was hard to throw, but it’s way harder up here. And it’s not just like it’s one person - there are loads of throwers in DCU so it’s affecting a lot of us."
A further complication for throwers when the circle is open is that the infield area at Morton Stadium is rented out for Gaelic games, meaning they aren’t keen on the surface being ripped up by hammers, shot puts and javelins.
"I had to miss the odd lecture here or there and have a word with the lecturers, but coming up to competitions I would have been talking to Adam King, who does the hammer as well, and he says just to compete at the Europeans, to get the training we need before, we won’t be able to attend lectures, which affects you when it comes to exams because you’re falling behind," said Walsh.
"We’re trying to balance both," said Walsh, who was speaking at the announcement of Irish Life Health as an official partner to Athletics Ireland.
Despite the lack of facilities in Dublin, Walsh is moving in the right direction in terms of athletics and she has a number of big aims for 2019.
She has the shot put at the Irish indoor Under-23s at the end of January and the European Under-23 Athletics Championships in Sweden in July, where she hopes to double up with shot and hammer, though this will depend on the competition schedule.
Walsh won a bronze in the 2017 European Under-20 Athletics Championships in the hammer.
