Sport

Corcoran claims a timely victory in impressive style

ATHLETICS/BRENNAN ROAD RACE: THE PROMISE of a better career from the American University athletics scholarship system does not…

Fri Jan 02 2009 - 00:00

ATHLETICS/BRENNAN ROAD RACE:THE PROMISE of a better career from the American University athletics scholarship system does not always work out as Richard Corcoran discovered. Four years ago he followed the likes of Ronnie Delany and Eamonn Coghlan to the reputable Villanova University, but there the familiarity ended and there was no gold at the end of the rainbow for the 24-year-old Raheny runner.

Yesterday Corcoran showed some of the promise that earned him that scholarship when he won the Tommy Brennan Memorial five-kilometre road race in the Phoenix Park in 14 minutes 44 seconds, an impressive 25 seconds ahead of Alan O'Brien of Crusaders, with Paul Fleming of Rathfarnham third in 15:12.

The victory could not have come at a better time for Corcoran as he is about to pick up the pieces of his career which came off the rails a little in Villanova. "It just did not work out for me over there and the training programme under Marcus O'Sullivan just did not suit me either," said Corcoran, who was a promising schools and junior athlete before going to the US.

"O'Sullivan's programme is based on interval work while any progress I made before going there was achieved on long, stamina-type of training and my coach in Raheny, Dick Hooper, agrees this is the route that suits be best and which I intend to take up again. So . . . my plan for 2009 is to keep working on the strength programme and hopefully I will get the results I feel are in me over the 1,500 metres."

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He has run a promising 3:46 for the distance but feels that has only scratched the surface. "Marcus and I got along fine except I just did not get the results under his programme . . . I'm delighted to be back home again and now it's a matter of picking up the pieces again and getting the improvements which I'm confident will come in the next couple of years."

Corcoran led virtually all the way and while O'Brien was on his slipstream at the first of the two laps he moved away in the second. "With a bit more opposition I think I would have taken the record," said Corcoran, who missed James Nolan's mark by just five seconds.

Azenera Gebrezgi of Celtic DCH won the women's event narrowly in 18:09 from her sister, Tekea, with DCH'S Lucy Darcy third in 18:56.