Nolan looking to bounce back from national final disappointment

Sport can be cruel. Ask Adam Nolan about it. At the recent National Athletics Championships St. Laurence O’Toole’s athlete was pipped for gold in the 110 metres hurdles.

A mistake at the last hurdle saw him all but pull up and Gerard O’Donnell Carrick-on-Shannon prevailed in a time of 14.20 seconds with the Carlow athlete 0.17 seconds behind.

Over a week later, the 19 year-old still struggles to put it behind him. There are so many positives. He admits himself that his form had been below par coming into the championships. Normally a silver would have been acceptable but to be pipped the way he was hurt him.

“It is tough. To be honest, I have tried not to think about it too much,” he agrees.

“I was fairly disappointed. My hope would have been to win the seniors. It slipped out of my hands unfortunately.”

He freely admits that his mind played tricks with him. Even over the closing metres, his head was not completely where it should have been.

“Usually when I am in a race I am highly focussed. I don’t really think about what I am doing. I let my body do the talking. Coming to the last hurdle because my training hasn’t been going too well recently, I was doubting myself a little bit. Then I realised I was actually in a position to win this here. When I thought that, it took me out of my focus a little bit. When you start thinking about what you are doing, that is when you start hitting hurdles,” he explains.

He took a week off after the championships. He is back now and preparing for the under 23 championships. All is not lost. Far from it.

“The way my season was going, yeah it is disappointing but if I had had a clean race, I would have been on a par to have one of my better times from last year. It is a good guide and sets me up well for next year when I try to qualify for the European under 23s,” the Carlow man reasons.