Molly Scott leads Ireland at World Relays
Molly Scott in action for Ireland at the 2026 World Athletics Relay Championships in the National Stadium, Gaborone, Botswana.
Closer to home the South Leinster Schools took place at the SETU campus in Carlow. This iteration hosted the first of three South Leinster fixtures, relays and walks along with the u16 individual events. There was ample Carlow representation with plenty of medals on offer and qualification for the Leinster schools in two weeks’ time. It was gold for St Leo’s Carlow in the Minor and Junior girls while DLS Bagnalstown took gold in the Junior Boys.
Away from the track, the road racing season continues with events hosted right throughout the country. Last weekend the Leinster Novice and Masters road Championships was held in Kilkenny with Tinryland AC taking third in the Masters O50 race.
There were individual masters medals for Tommy Payne and JJ Murphy. At the Tinryland Village half-marathon also held last weekend, St Laurence O’Toole’s Ian Molloy who was the first Carlow athlete home, taking silver. The team section saw St Laurence O’Toole take first and third places.
In the high-stakes world of sprinting, where races are decided in hundredths of a second, Molly Scott has built her career on mastering those miniscule margins.
The St Laurence O’Toole sprinter and hurdler was part of the Irish team for the World Championships in Botswana, the first time a major World Athletics event has been held in the continent of Africa.
“Officially selected as part of the 4x100m team… it’s been four years since I made my last national team,” Scott said, reflecting on the moment. The selection represents a comeback of sorts after injury setbacks, and a renewed opportunity to contribute on the world stage.
Competing at the World Relays last Saturday Scott was assign the first relay leg, starting the team from the blocks. Running a blistering 100m she handed the baton to Irish national champion Ciara Neville (Emerald AC) with a perfect baton change.
Unfortunately, later changes did not go so well with the team dropping the baton and earning a DNF. In an interview after the race Scott expressed disappointment at the result:
“Obviously we are disappointed that we did not get it (the baton) around. We worked quiet hard over the past few weeks. We are starting all over again with the relay, building the programme up from the bottom back to the top hopefully in LA. We are going to make mistakes and hopefully we can do better tomorrow”, she said.
These sentiments were echoed by her team-mates Ciara Neville, Molly O’Reilly and Sarah Leahy. There was another opportunity for the ladies as all non-qualifier’s compete in the repechage rounds the following day. There were no incidents on day 2 with the team finishing in 4th place with a season’s best of 44.25.
Scott had spent the previous two weeks at a training camp in South Africa with her team mates, training and preparing for this event. While Gaborone offered the most direct route for qualification for the 2027 World Championships in Beijing, failure to qualify does not mean that the team is out of the championships. The remaining places will be offered through the world ranking system. If Scott and her team-mates can run consistently fast times over the coming months and gain a good ranking, they still stand a chance at making Beijing next year.
The team will now focus on gaining qualification for this year’s European Championships in Birmingham. The top ranked 16 teams in Europe will be selected. With personal bests of 7.19 seconds for 60m and 11.41 for 100m, the Carlow athlete will be looking to take these down a notch in an effort to secure her place permanently on the team.
No stranger to World and European Majors, Scott took bronze in the 100m hurdles at the 2016 European Youth Championships. Two years later at the World u20 Championships she was a member of the Irish team that took silver in the 4x100m relay. The team on that occasion included Ciara Neville, her team-mate in Gaborone, as well as Gina Apke-Moses (elder sister of Patience) and Patience Jumbo Gula.
The Leinster Novice and Masters road championships during its early years were often hosted by Carlow. Held in Tinryland they attracted large crowds in the Novice – with some prestige being attributed to being a Leinster Road Novice champion.
These days the masters championships has over shadowed the novice race. Testimony to this is the numbers competing at last weekend’s races in Gowran, where the numbers in the masters events were double that of the novice race. For some Carlow athletes like Tommy Payne, they remember all too well the competitive days of the Leinster road race, when they were at the height of their careers. Last weekend Tommy Payne won gold in the over 65 masters and helped his Tinryland team take bronze in the over 50 club section.
Payne finished 25th overall in a time of 22.39. JJ Murphy took O70 silver, just 8 seconds behind the winner Francis Flemming (St Abbans).
The team of Tommy Payne, JJ Murphy and John Dillion took bronze in the masters team category. The same three athletes scored on the county Carlow team that were beaten by just three points for the county bronze medals.
The first of three South Leinster Schools championships took place at the SETU campus last Tuesday. Carlow athletes swapped their club colours for those of their school, competing with rather than against many of their usual competitors from other athletic clubs.
As expected there was much success in the relay events. The Presentation/DLS Bagnelstown took gold in the Junior Boys 4x100, with storming legs from Harry Butcher and Sean Og Forde. They outsprinted a much fancied Naas CBS team to take the title in a convincing manner. So too was the St Leo’s victory in the Junior girls. Aided by National Indoor medallist Emily Kidd, the St Leo’s girls proved too strong for Cross and Passion Kilcullen. It was a Carlow 1-2 in the minor girls with St Leo’s taking gold from Presentation Carlow.
There was consolation for Pres as they took gold in the senior girls relay.
Individual events were held for the u16s. Royahnot Oladumeji (St Leo’s) took gold in the u16 girls shot putt, her three throws surpassing those of silver medal winner Abby Kepple (Tullow CS) who took silver. Kepple in turn was well clear of the bronze medal winner Isabelle Allen (Loreto, Kilkenny). Fiach Gaffney (Knockbeg College) took bronze in the u16 Long Jump. This week the action continues where individual spots are up for grabs for the forthcoming Leinster Schools championships.
The second offering of the Tinryland Village half Marathon took place last weekend, with a total of 367 runners taking part. The race was held over a relatively flat 3 loop course around Tinryland Village. Numbers this year increased from 2025 despite the numerous other events being held at the weekend.
The overall winner was Brian Conroy (Clane AC). Local athlete Ian Molloy (St Laurence O’Toole) took silver with Wexford’s James Doyle finishing third. The St Laurence O’Toole team of Molloy, Seamus McEnhill, Leslie Graham and Eddie Dooley took gold. The St Laurence O’Toole B team took bronze.
