Paul Pollock and Kevin Seaward look to CWG after NI athletes impress at IAAF World HM Championships

26 March 2018

Paul Pollock and Kevin Seaward look to CWG after NI athletes impress at IAAF World HM Championships

Paul Pollock (Annadale Striders / Andrew Hobdell) took 77th place at the IAAF World Half-Marathon Championships in Valencia on Saturday (24th March 2018) in his final tune-up before running the marathon at the Commonwealth Games next month.

The 31-year-old from Belfast finished in a time of 1:04:29, less than five minutes behind Geoffrey Kamworor of Kenya who took his third title at the event in 1:00:02.

His Northern Ireland team-mate at Gold Coast 2018, Kevin Seaward (St Malachy’s AC / Andrew Hobdell), was 85th in 1:04.56 with compatriot Stephen Scullion (Clonliffe Harriers/ Stephen Haas) seven places further back in 1:05:19.

“It was a real grind,” said Pollock, who will join the Northern Ireland squad in Australia on Monday. “When you come in at this level not 100% on your game, you always get found out. Fun experience but disappointing result. Onwards to Australia.”

Kilkeel-based mother-of-four Laura Graham (Mourne Runners / Ryan Maxwell) was 78th in the women’s race in 1:16:27 on her debut for Ireland, with Fionnuala Ross (Armagh AC / Dermot Kerr) just four places and 26 seconds behind in 1:16:53.

Ethiopia’s Netsanet Kebebe broke the world record for a women-only race to land the title in 1:06.11.

Results and placings for the full Ireland team are below:

Men:

Paul Pollock – 1:04:29 (77th place)
Kevin Seaward – 1:04:56 (85th place)
Stephen Scullion – 1:05:19 (92nd place)
Sergiu Ciobanu – 1:06:19 (101st place)
Kevin Dooney – 1:12:14 (135th place)

Ladies:

Lizzie Lee – 1:13:19 (46th place)
Claire McCarthy – 1:14:20 (57th place)
Laura Graham – 1:16:27 (78th place)
Laura Shaughnessy – 1:16:28 (79th place)
Fionnuala Ross – 1:16:53 (82nd place)

Full results for the event are available HERE.