Craughwell AC athletes were in top form at the National juvenile finals in the last few weekends with 8 individual medals and 2 sets of relay medals. Other articles detail the successes of the U19 girls and the relay team performances. The remainder of many fine performances are detailed below.

In the long jump, Claire Ryder added another National bronze medal to her growing collection when jumping 4.96m in the U15 girls’ event. This is Claire's 5th time getting National bronze and she is very close to taking a National title and also very close to international standard for this event. Maria McNamara had a strong series of jumps in the U16 girls long jump to finish in 7th place overall with a good jump of 4.73m into a headwind while Karan Roche finished 10th in the U17 girls and Kelvin Olayemi finished in 9th place in the U14 boys.

In the sprints, the club had its best ever performance at this level with 4 athletes making the sprint finals and 2 narrowly missing out on a final place. Kelvin Olayemi led the way with a fantastic silver medal in the U14 boys 80m in a time of 10.42, with Aidan Conneely hot on his heels to take 5th place in a time of 10.51. Tara McNally was very close to the medal podium when taking 4th place in the U13 girls 80m in a time of 10.89, while Sinead Treacy had a fantastic performance to take 8th place in the U14 girls 80m in a time of 11.10. Niall Higgins competed well on his first time in the National finals in the U18 boys 100m while Claire Ryder narrowly missed out on making the U15 girls 100m final when recording a time of 13.38 in the heats. In the U14 200m races, Sinead Treacy and Aidan Conneely recorded very good times of 28.11 and 26.77 but just missed out on making the finals.

The throwing events saw a new star emerge for the club with Cathal O’Brien taking a fine bronze medal in the U13 boys shot putt with a huge throw of 10.23m. Siobhan Connolly took 13th place with a throw of 8.31m in the U14 girls shot while Kate Gilligan finished 15th in the U12 girls shot with 5.35m. The club continues to make great progress in the javelin with Tara McNally 6th in the U13 girls with 18.57m, Katie Donoghue 6th in the U14 girls, Oisin McNally 6th in the U15 boys with 31.05m, Andrew O’Boyle 12th in the U13 boys with 16.79m and Cathal O’Brien 15th in the U13 boys with 13.11m. In the U12 girls ball throw, Michelle Duggan finished 14th with 24.17 while Dylan Finn and Oisin O’Brien finished 10th and 11th in the U12 boys event with 27.61m and 22.17m. 

The middle-distance races were tough battles with Brian Loughnane taking 11th place in the U12 boys 600m in a time of 1.59.56, Oisin Doyle 10th in the U13 boys 600m in a time of 1.49.37 and Jamie Spellman 14th in the U14 boys 800m in a time of 2.28.07. The 1500m races provided the final action for the club on the 3rd day of competition with 5 athletes battling hard against tough opposition – Damien O’Boyle finished 14th in the U14 boys in a time of 4.56.18, Conor Gillen 8th and Matthew Moran 13th in the U15 boys in times of 4.41.92 and 5.14.20, Finn Stoneman 11th in the U16 boys in 4.30.02 and Peadar Harvey 11th in the U18 boys in 4.23.84.