Claire Fagan smashes 10,000m personal best

After the lengthy layoff caused by Covid-19, track and field athletics has been getting back up and going in the last fortnight.

Mullingar Harriers athlete Claire Fagan travelled to Morton Stadium in Santry, Dublin on Wednesday of last week to compete in the first Dublin Graded Meeting.

Fagan (pictured above with her mum, Geri) was competing in the 10,000m and was in the thick of it from the gun. After a first half mile at 5m30 mile pace, she settled back to running 83/84 second laps and ran these consistently over the next half an hour.

After 23 laps, Fagan made her push for home and dropped the pace to 5m15 mile pace and as a result, she rapidly closed in on her training partner, Laura Mooney, in the closing stages. Mooney held on to win in a time of 34.41, with Fagan running 34.46.

This represented a 75-second personal best for the young Mullingar Harrier, who last year ran 36.01 to qualify for the European U23 Championships in Gävle, Sweden.

Fagan’s run places her 41st on Athletics Ireland’s All-Time Performance List for Women’s 10,000m, and her ranking places her as the fastest Westmeath woman ever over the distance.

The Mullingar girl’s 10,000m success comes on the back of her 2019 European medal win as part of Ireland’s U23 women’s team, and her individual victory in the Celtic Cross Country in January 2020.

Fagan’s range of talent stretches much wider than 10,000m and cross country, as in the 2020 Indoor season she won both the All-Ireland U23 800m and the Irish Universities 3,000m.