NICOLA Tuthill admits she has Eileen O’Keeffe’s Irish women’s hammer record firmly in her sights.

The Kilbrittain thrower has moved to within 73 centimetres of O’Keeffe’s longstanding mark of 73.21m, set in 2007.

Tuthill’s latest personal best of 72.48m represents another significant step forward. It improved on the 71.75m she threw last August and powered the West Cork athlete (22) to a silver medal at the European Throwing Cup in Nicosia.

‘It’s definitely something I have had my eyes on,’ Tuthill said of O’Keeffe’s Irish record.

‘Seventy-three (metres) is a massive throw and it’s not going to come easily, but it is something I’d like to achieve in the future.’

For now, Tuthill is moving firmly in the right direction, beginning her season in style with a silver medal at a competition where she has excelled in recent years.

In 2023 and 2024 she won silver medals in the U23 category, before making history last year when she became the first Irish athlete to win gold at the European Throwing Cup, topping the podium in the U23 event.

This year, stepping up to senior level, Tuthill again showed her class, finishing second behind Denmark’s Katrine Koch Jacobsen, who produced a winning throw of 75.52m.

‘It’s amazing. There’s no better day to do it than at a European Throwing Cup,’ Tuthill said of her new personal best.

‘It’s been coming a long time. It makes it that extra bit special to do it in a first senior outing.

‘There were a lot of really strong girls competing. The European champion from 2024 and the bronze medallist from the Europeans were both behind me – it was pretty cool to beat them.

‘There were a lot of girls in there with really strong PBs, so I was delighted to bring out a PB.’

This was Tuthill’s season opener, later than usual after an injury late last year disrupted her winter training block, so she will take plenty of encouragement from hitting a personal best in her first competition.

‘I missed that heavy block of winter training, so we’re going to go back, sit down with my coach and plan out the next while,’ she explained.

‘I’d say we’ll go back into more of a winter training block, just to get those heavy reps in, and then compete again at the end of May maybe.

‘The main one this year will be the European Championships in August. They’re later in the year and I’ve already hit the automatic qualifying standard for them.

‘It’s about gearing up towards that and hopefully producing another few throws around that 72, maybe a bit further.’