Seventeen-time Irish champion PHIL HEALY gives her verdict on the national senior championships

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I’VE always loved the national championships, so this year it felt a bit different, watching on instead of being on the track.

It's only been a month since I announced my retirement from athletics, so being back at the nationals was going to be a good barometer of how I’m feeling. Honest answer? Okay, you miss the competitive side, but I’m so at peace with it.

I don’t have that feeling of ‘I wish I was out there’.

I was out there for so many years, 14 years in a row, had never missed a nationals, and you know what? It’s nice to sit back, enjoy the sport and watch everybody excel, like Rhasidat Adeleke.

Rhasidat was one of the standout performers. The race of the weekend was Rhasidat’s 200m final on Saturday when she delivered when she had to.

I’ve run with Rhasidat on Irish relay teams and against her too, and she’s a fierce competitor. She’s had a tough time recently so to come up with a big performance to win her first senior outdoor national 200m title was important for her, also because her winning time of 22.80 – a championship record – was inside the European Championships qualifying standard of 22.85 to book her place at Birmingham.

Rhasidat looked so impressive in the heat, too – she ran 23.3, but she was cruising. To go out and run that final with so much pressure on her, in far-from-ideal conditions, you have to give her huge credit.

I was at Morton Stadium on Sunday, but on Saturday I was watching it at home in Ballineen, leaping around the sitting room afterwards, just with delight!

There’s so much pressure on Rhasidat all the time, and it really frustrates me in the media. There were big athletes who weren’t there this weekend, and there was nothing about them, yet they are favourites for Europeans and have been favourites at other championships.

Rhasidat is a household name already. The pressure she has is incredible, and sometimes people automatically have the medal around her neck before she even steps on the line at a major championship.

People forget she’s only 23.

Even last summer, when she chose not to go to the World Championships, that was Rhasidat’s choice. We have to put athlete welfare first. Whether she was injured or whether she needed a break mentally, that was her decision, and it was a decision to set her up for 2026.

If she had gone and performed under par, she would have got criticism for going. Sometimes there’s no win.

An athlete isn’t a robot, no matter who they are. They can’t come out year after year, as much as we want them to perform. It’s hard. It’s very hard.

People commenting on that know exactly how hard it is as an athlete, and what it takes. Then you add in the pressure she has because nobody has had that pressure before. She finished fourth in the Paris Olympics individually. She is phenomenal.

Sophie Becker, Phil Healy, Rhasidat Adeleke and Sharlene Mawdsley celebrate winning silver medals at the 2024 Europeans.

I saw a headline on an online story after her heat on Saturday, saying she missed out on qualifying time. But if you actually watched the race, she cruised through. It wasn’t even an opportunity to qualify; Rhasidat was saving herself for the final. And she delivered when she had to.

I do feel extra defensive and protective around Rhasidat because she’s one of my relay team-mates, so it was super to see her silence a few critics.

You also have to give credit to the crowd. I’ve never seen a crowd like that at nationals on a Saturday. They were there for Rhasidat, without a doubt, and that crowd spurred her on as well. She wanted to put on a show, but it was just wonderful to see her perform under pressure and hold it together.

Then it was obviously very bittersweet seeing Sharlene Mawdsley pull up in the same women’s 200m final, because just as you have one person potentially back in the relay, you have another possibly going from the relay.

That was very hard to watch, especially when Sharlene’s in such unbelievable shape. I think she’s ranked fifth or sixth in Europe at the moment, so with Europeans only two weeks away, for something like that to happen so close is gutting.

Fingers crossed, based on the scan, we’ll see how it comes back. It’s obviously a very tight window, but hopefully it’s very, very minor.

I obviously take a lot of interest in the Irish women’s relay. We’ve worked so, so hard to take it to a level where we medalled at the Europeans in 2024, and then finished fourth at the Paris Olympics.

A lot of people stepped up in the women’s 400m, which was really good to see, because there was a point where that relay was very much in jeopardy. There are eyes on that relay to perform again. There is expectation there.

It was super to see Rachel McCann step up and get a PB in a national final – she ran 52.93 to win the women’s 400m title. There were a lot of 53-second runs on Sunday, so they’re putting themselves into contention for those spots for Europeans.

On Sunday, I was down on the track for the women’s 400m final just knowing there was so much on the line, especially for Sophie Becker. I’ve roomed with Sophie for so many years, and I knew how much she wanted a really good performance. I felt the nerves here to be honest, knowing what she’s been through and what she wanted here.

Sophie finished second, in 53.23, and was obviously disappointed, but she went out there and probably went through 200 or 300 metres a little too quickly, and that cost her over the last 100.

You know what it feels like as an athlete when you come up short, or things don’t go to plan, and you don’t want other athletes to feel like that. It was a hard race for Sophie, but you have days like that as an athlete.

A positive from the weekend is the depth in Irish sprinting right now. We have so much talent coming through. When Israel Olatunde gets back to full health and is over his injury, between Israel, Benjamin Richardson, Bori Akinola and Sean Aigboboh – the latter trio were the top three in the men’s 100m – there is so much talent there. Richardson ran a championship record of 10.13, and the Waterford-born man will be eligible to represent Ireland next year.

It’s so great to see the depth coming through on the men’s sprinting side, and they will definitely be dominating in the relays in the coming years.

And, of course, we have to salute the local athlete flying the West Cork flag.

Darragh McElhinney went out and produced a brilliant performance to win the men’s 5000m title. Darragh and Jack O'Leary were taking turns at the front and pulling each other through. It can get lonely over that many laps, so it was great to see. But Darragh looked so dominant over the closing lap and it was brilliant to see him performing the way we all know he can.

Laura Nicholson, from my own club Bandon AC, was involved in a really good battle in the women’s 1500m and fought so hard – she was chasing the qualifying standard for the Europeans, just fell outside it but gave it a great go. Sophie O’Sullivan won gold here. It was a championship record time for Sophie of 4:05.62, which took the record that her mom, Sonia, set in 1995. For Laura, it was silver in 4:08.27. National champion here last year, and now silver, that’s consistent.

Another Bandon AC woman performing on the big stage is Nicola Tuthill who won her fifth senior hammer throw title, and fourth in a row. She just keeps delivering. To be able to perform week after week, produce that consistency and hopefully bring it into the European Championships as well is hugely encouraging.

And we had Fiona Everard, another Bandon AC athlete, winning silver in the women’s 3000m too. Fiona is keeping the Ballineen/Enniskeane flag flying. Her mom was our school secretary at St Mary’s Central School in Enniskeane!

One of the highlights of the weekend was acknowledging Ciara Mageean and the recognition she deserved in the Run with Ciara event on Sunday. There were over 450 kids there to run with Ciara, and she has been an inspiration on and off the track for years.

She’s an absolute gem of a person, as is her family, and she is fighting her biggest battle at the moment after being diagnosed with stage-four cancer. Ciara could see on Sunday that we’re all there to help and support her, but behind the scenes it’s her and her family, and it’s hard.

It was a reminder of what’s really important.