Ciara Mageean put her injury woes behind her with a strong performance in the Bristol Track Club 5km. File photo
Ciara Mageean put her injury woes behind her with a strong performance in the Bristol Track Club 5km. File photo
Ciara Mageean put recent injury issues firmly behind her by making a winning return at the Bristol Track Club 5km in England yesterday, the 31-year-old clocking 15:24. That carved 20 seconds off her previous best for the distance and brought her home 26 seconds clear of runner-up Ellie Wallace.
Mageean enjoyed a breakthrough season in 2022, winning 1,500m silver at the Commonwealth Games and European Championships before taking her first Diamond League victory in Brussels, where she broke Sonia O’Sullivan’s Irish record and clocked 3:56.63.
But she endured a rough winter, her sole outing of the indoor season coming in Boston in February, where she dropped out of the 3,000m.
Afterwards, she explained she had missed several weeks of training due to a tear in her peroneal tendon.
“It was really good,” she said of her comeback race. “I always find 5ks hard as I don’t know how to gauge myself, but I stuck to the pacer and was hoping for 15:30. Seeing as I had a broken-up winter, that’s a good marker going into camp. I felt very controlled until 2k and I held tight, stayed on pace, and I feel like there’s more in the legs.”
Mageean will now complete a stint of altitude training in St. Moritz, Switzerland, before opening her track season at the World Athletics Continental Tour challenger meeting in Belfast over 800m on May 13.
“It’s always nice to head back home and open the season, I ran a 1:59 there last year and managed to lose the Irish record to a fantastic runner (Louise Shanahan), but I’ve got unfinished business and I want to get that Irish record back.”
There was another Irish win in the men’s event, with Efrem Gidey clocking 13:49 to come home with eight seconds to spare over Zakariya Mahamed, the winning time not far off Gidey’s track PB of 13:44.
The 22-year-old, who finished sixth in the 10,000m at the European Championships last year, has enjoyed a fine start to the year, clocking 27:57 for 10km on the roads in Valencia and finishing seventh at the European Clubs Cross Country in Oropresa del Mar, Spain.