Additional trio elated to get late Beijing call

OLYMPIC GAMES NEWS:ONE OF them was planning a holiday in Spain, one of them was actually on holiday in Spain, and the other was planning a night out. Then the call came through: pack your bags; you're off to the Olympics.

If the Olympic Council of Ireland surprised a few people with their decision to include three further athletes on the team for Beijing, none were more surprised than the athletes themselves.

It was around 9pm on Sunday when the decision to accept the three B-standard qualifiers - in addition to the 13 on A standards - was announced, right on the cut-off date, and calculated to spark excited reaction.

Thomas Chamney, who had earlier won the 800 metres at the national championships, was having dinner with his parents, suggesting he'd probably book a holiday in Lanzarote while the Olympics were on. Chamney last week ran 1:46.66, inside the B standard - but in the end that was enough to book his ticket.

"It's been an unbelievable, long, hard year," said Chamney at yesterday's team launch in Dublin, "and for a while there, I really thought things were going down the toilet. Then it just turned, and I do feel I'm rounding into form now."

Chamney, at 24, thus makes his first Olympics, and it's a well-deserved selection for the Dubliner, partly based on his prospects for London 2012.

Michelle Carey, also from Dublin, had run the B standard in the 400-metre hurdles (her best of 56.19), and having also won the national title on Sunday, was with another Olympian, Joanne Cuddihy, planning a night out.

"I hadn't given up hope of still getting the A standard, and when they picked two swimmers on the B standard, that gave me some hope as well," she said. "I've run 56 seconds eight or nine times since January, probably over-raced, so I really thought I was having a good season anyway, running competitively.

"So I hadn't made any plans for August, no. The funny thing is my parents are booked to go to Beijing, from back in December. They wanted to go anyway, even to make a holiday of it. So they did have it all planned. I just don't think they have tickets for the athletics."

For Pauline Curley, who was called up for the marathon having run the B standard in Rotterdam last April, the news was particularly dramatic. She's on holiday in Torremolinos on the Costa del Sol with her husband, Adrian, and seven-year-old son, Emmet, and at 39, she had good reason to suspect her Olympic dream was truly over.

Suddenly it came alive again when she received a text message from Ireland team manager Patsy McGonagle.

"When I got the message that I'd been selected, I felt as if every drop of blood drained from by body," she said.

"I was shocked, just could not believe that this was happening to me, and I felt this sense of elation run through every bone of my body. It was so unexpected that I had a problem taking it all in it. Then I got another call about it from a friend, and I had to ask were they just winding me up.

"I was just absolutely thrilled and so excited that I did not get a wink of sleep last night. No matter what kind of an athlete you are you always have a dream about competing in the Olympics, and from the day I took up running as a teenager, it was my dream too. And so for it to happen to me now at this stage of my career after so many years of training and racing all over the country is the most wonderful feeling imaginable."

Curley, a part-time chef in her native Tullamore, has a bit of a race on her hands to bring everything together before Beijing, but she has been back training consistently in recent weeks, having run her 2:39.01 back in April, just shy of the 2:37 A standard.

It's a race she's already begun - and first thing yesterday morning she hit the beaches around Torremolinos for a run.

"Needless to say my feet barely touched the ground but I've always found running a great way of relaxing and clearing the head and the longer I ran the better I felt. We had planned this break a while back, and I suppose secretly I wanted to be home in plenty of time to watch the Olympics on television. Now I will be part of it myself. We are returning home on Friday, and then I have less than a week to pack my bags again and get measured for the Olympic outfit. Luckily it's nice and sunny here and that will be good preparation for Beijing."

From the outset, the Olympic Council of Ireland were adamant only A standards would be considered for Beijing, but that all changed in recent days.

McGonagle explained at the team launch he was confident submitting the three additional B-standard athletes would be greeted sympathetically.

"Let's just say the relationship between Athletics Ireland and the Olympic Council of Ireland is now better than it's ever been," he said.

"But it's just about supporting our athletes as much as possible, and if any more athletes do produce A standards in the coming days then we'd be supportive of them as well."

Besides, the previous number, 13, was just tempting fate. So 16 athletes will now make the trip, their departure starting on Friday week. All are reporting fit and healthy, with the exception of the 400-metre runner Joanne Cuddihy, who is nursing a calf strain but remains hopeful of making the start line in Beijing.

Four Beijing-bound athletes - David Gillick (400 metres), Paul Hession (200 metres), Alistair Cragg (5,000 metres) and RóisíMcGettigan (3,000-metre steeplechase) - will run in Saturday's London Grand Prix as part of their final build-up.