Lombard to take on big names

Athletics/News: It has taken a while, but Cathal Lombard is ready now for his first race since becoming the Irish 10,000-metre record holder. On Sunday in Manchester he runs the same distance, this time on the roads and against some of the most respected distance men in the business, including Kenya's world marathon record holder Paul Tergat.

Yet Lombard has earned plenty of respect of his own since running 27 minutes, 33.53 seconds in California back on April 30th, which creamed 13 seconds off Mark Carroll's previous Irish record. It was also comfortably inside the qualifying standard for the Athens Olympics and has left the 28-year-old Cork athlete with the fourth fastest time in the world this year - with not a fellow European in sight.

"The offer of this Manchester race actually came a few weeks ago," he says. "The elite race director asked me about running this one or Balmoral, and came up with a good appearance fee. Manchester fitted in fine, so we decided to go for it.

"But of course it's only a road race and I'm not going to take it very hard, or ease down too much for it. It's a good field, with some real quality athletes to run against and that's always a good thing."

Lombard talks of his plans in the plural because everything he does now is closely consulted with Joe Doonan, the coach best known for taking Catherina McKiernan to the top of women's distance running. Doonan was behind Lombard's breakthrough run of 13:19.22 over 5,000 metres last summer, and since then the trust has been complete.

"I sat down with Joe just a few days after the World Championships and straight away we targeted the Stanford race in California. We knew it had the potential to be fast and definitely worth focusing on. It was an excellent night for running. It didn't come easy, but I do think the more races you run at that level the more accustomed you become."

Manchester is just a brief stop-off on a carefully planned route to the Olympics. He'll train at home in Cork for most of June, then take in the Rome Grand Prix before hitting the high altitude of St Moritz, and the final polishing for Athens.

Sonia O'Sullivan will also use the Manchester 10k as part of her build-up to Athens.