Irish athletes will return to action at the World Athletics Championships tonight on Day Six of the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon.
Mark English (Finn Valley AC) will be the first Irish athlete in action in the early hours of Thursday morning when he races in heat 5 of the Men’s 800m at 1:52am. The Donegal man who holds the Irish record over the distance having ran 1.44.71 last year comes into the championships on the back of winning the national senior title last month.
Back in June, English ran a Seasons Best of 1.46.02 in Spain. The first three in each heat plus the six fastest times will qualify for the semi-finals. The fastest in the field this year is Canada’s Marco Arop. Arop has ran 1.43.61 this year and won gold at the Pan-American Games back in 2019.
Rhasidat Adeleke (Tallaght AC) will be looking to make her first global final tonight when she runs in the semi-finals of the Women’s 400m. Adeleke goes in the first of three semi-finals at 2:45am Irish Time. The top two will advance automatically to the final with the two other fastest times also getting a final place.
Adeleke has had a ground-breaking season setting national records in the 60m, 200m, 300m, and 400m. Her strong performance to finish second in the heat ensured that she got a good lane draw. The Dubliner will go from lane 5 and will have two-time Olympic champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo on her outside. Adeleke will likely need to run under her national record to qualify for the final.
Irish athletes in action on Day Six of World Championships
Chris O’Donnell (North Sligo AC) will run for the fourth time in the space of five days at Hayward Field tonight when he races in the semi-finals of the Men’s 400m. O’Donnell finished fourth in his heat advancing to the next round as the final non-automatic qualifier.
The Sligo man will go from lane 2 in the second semi-final at 3:23am. It has been a fantastic season for O’Donnell who recently won yet another national title and was part of the Mixed 4x400m Relay team who ran in the world final on Saturday morning. He also moved to joint second on the Irish All-Time list recently when he clocked 45.26s in Madrid moving him alongside Brian Gregan and behind only David Gillick. Fastest in O’Donnell’s semi-final is Grenadian Kirani James who won gold at the London 2012 Olympics and most recently won bronze in Tokyo last year.
