OConnor Stuns the World with Silver in Tokyo

When the Commonwealth Games, European Indoor, World Indoor and World University Games Medallist crossed  the line just 2.18 seconds behind defending World Champion Katerina Johnson-Thompson she instantly knew that she had secured a World Championship silver medal. In the process she defeated a triple Olympic Champion, a double world champion and the 2025 World and European indoor champion whilst moving from 94th on the all time lists to be come the 30th best Heptathlete in history.

Kate’s silver secured an excellent championships for the Irish team and ensured that Athletics NI exceeded our Sport NI target of one top 16 and one top 8. In fact our relay runners added two top 16 results with Conor Kelly helping the mixed 4x400m to 11th place and Rachel McCann (with Jenna Breen in the squad) finishing 16th in the women’s 4x400m.

This truly world class performance was a long time in the making as Kate and Michael O’Connor first came onto the Athletics NI radar in 2014 when then ANI Talent Lead Laura Kerr noticed an athlete winning an unusual double gold at the Irish Schools Championships; the Junior Girls Javelin and the 800m. At this stage they were training in Newry with Kookie O’Hagen helping Michael with the 800m.

Kate, who is Newry born and whose mother Valerie is from Ballymena, subsequently began coming to Athletics NI organised Schools Combined Events training sessions and joined the Rising Stars programme based at Jordanstown working with the likes of Adam McMullen and Dean Adams. Kate continued to improve rapidly, breaking a certain Katerina Johnson-Thompson’s Schools International Pentathlon Championship Record in 2015 and it wasn’t long until she entered the Youth Academy aged 15 and was awarded financial support from the Mary Peters Trust.

Managing a two day combined events competition is a skill that can only be learned by competing with athletes more experienced than yourself and Kate benefitted from performing at European U18 (7th), European U20 (8th), European Team Champs (3rd), and 2018 Commonwealth Games 8th all before she turned 18. Following these performances she was awarded Athlete Award funding from Sport NI which contributes towards the high costs of competing in one of the more expensive events given the training camps, two day competitions based abroad and diverse equipment needs.

Kate truly announced herself on the international stage in 2019 winning the silver medal at the European U20 Championships in 2019 with a phenomenal score of 6093 and in the process beating the NI senior Javelin record of Laura Kerr, her Javelin coach at the time, a mark of 52.92m that stood until Saturday at the Tokyo World Championships.

In Autumn 2019 Kate briefly moved to Sheffield Hallam University and trained with an international class group including 2022 Commonwealth Bronze medallist and Tokyo 2025 8th placer Jade O’Dowda. When covid hit she returned home to train with her father and subsequently achieved an enormous 6297 in Italy, a Northern Irish and Irish record that lasted until this year.

In the middle of 2021 Michael as head coach, along with ANI Performance Lead Tom Reynolds formalised a performance team, including Kerry Kirk (Physio) and Robbie Bremner (S&C) around Kate with the aim of lifting performances in every area in order to win a medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games and ultimately qualify for the Olympic Games in Paris. A feat she achieved on both counts.

In the build up to Paris, the performance team grew with Lorna Cooke (Physio) and David Sweeney (Javelin) adding expertise. Kate began a masters at Ulster University which came with a scholarship that allowed her to live at her main training base of Jordanstown during the week. This support and top class facility access has been a vital key to her success in the past few years.

So, coming to Tokyo, at the end of a long season where she had already set three Pentathlon PB’s (winning two major medals) and one Heptathlon PB to win the World University Games, Kate was looking in a good position to challenge for a top 8.

Day 1 had a very unusual 5.30pm start and very little time between events but Kate rattled off PB after PB with 13.44 in the 100m hurdles for 8th place (having finished 23rd her in Paris 2024) and 1.86m in the High Jump finishing 3rd behind triple Olympic champion Nafi Thiam and World leader Anna Hall. A very solid 14.37m shot consolidated this position and an excellent 200m PB of 24.04 moved her into second spot overnight with the main contenders being the 2024 Olympic medalists and the 2025 European Indoor medalists with Anna Hall way out in front.

Day 2 saw the Long Jump, a hugely improved event for Kate but still a relatively weak event compared to the World’s best. She was, however,  closer to her best than most with 6.22m and although she dropped to 4th she actually improved her position relative to expectations.

Unfortunately during her final and best jump Kate picked up an injury to her knee and spent the next 4 hours with SNISI Physio Kerry Kirk ensuring the area was as supported and secured as possible going into the Javelin, a pivotal moment in the competition. The eventual plan was to fully commit to round one of the Javelin and Kate did just that, setting a new PB and NI record of 53.03m to win the event and move into third place.

All that was left was two laps of the Japan National Stadium and ensuring that she was six seconds ahead of Talliah Brooks and no more than 12 seconds behind Johnson-Thompson. Kate ran a sensible first lap and picked up with 300m to go maintaining the gap behind and in front of her main rivals, crossing the line in a new PB of 2:09.56 as World silver medalist with 6714 points and making Northern Irish and Irish Athletics history.