Young City of Derry Multi Eventer Finn ONeill Sets All-Time Pentathlon Best

Finn began the day with impressive PBs in the 75mH (12.55s w+0.9) and Shot (12.03m) before performing close to his best in his three favoured events the Long Jump (5.17m w+1.9), High Jump (1.50m) and 800m (2:11.66). The total added 70 points onto James Dunford’s score from 1998.

Athlete Development Lead, Tom Reynolds, commented “It is really encouraging to see aspiring young athletes like Finn taking up multi events at this stage of their development. At Athletics NI it is our belief that all athletes (aged 12-15) should be exposed to a multi event approach in their early years so that they can enjoy trying a range of events and gaining a huge variety of movement skills and physical competencies, before moving onto the Event Group Stage where they may choose to be a sprinter/hurdler, endurance athlete, jumper, thrower or continue with multi events.

There will be development opportunities for U15 and U17 multi event athletes in 2019 such as the England Combined Events Championships in August which includes the technical disciplines involved in senior multi events (Boys: Discus, Javelin, Pole Vault Girls: Javelin). I hope that this early success will encourage Finn and his support team to continue to develop the necessary skills and abilities required to have success in the combined events at the U15 level and beyond.”