Aislinn Crossey wins Irish 800m title at Santry

Newry athlete Aislinn Crossey completed a remarkable 10 days by clinching her first Irish Senior National title at Santry on Sunday.

A week after her surprise fourth at the European Junior Championships, the 17-year-old secured victory in the 800m.

Crossey, who benefited from the absence of Roseanne Galligan and Laura Crowe, ran 2:07.49 with Alanna Lally second.

She cut three seconds off her previous best at the European Juniors as she clocked 2:03.9 in the final.

After his 800m heroics in London on Friday night, Mark English had to settle for a silver at Santry but it was a thoroughly satisfactory performance from the Letterkenny man who had moved down in distance to tackle the 400m.

Using the shorter event as speed work before his upcoming challenge at the World Championships, the 20-year-old cut .29secs off his previous 400m best as he clocked 47.27 to finish narrowly behind Brian Murphy (47.14).

Jason Harvey improved his personal best by .13secs as he produced a time of 50.13 in an exciting 400m hurdles final but once again his big domestic rival Thomas Barr broke 50 seconds as he took victory in 49.78.

With English otherwise engaged, Kildare runner Paul Robinson took his expected victory in the 800m in 1:48.92 ahead of Ferrybank's Niall Tuohy (1:50.53) and Letterkenny athlete Darren McBrearty (1:50.83).

Holder Amy Foster's absence from the championships allowed Kelly Proper to take her fourth gold of the weekend as the Waterford woman won the 100m in 11.78 with Ailis McSweeney (11.88) in second.

Proper had won Saturday's 200m in 23.64 ahead of Niamh Whelan (24.01) with European Youth Olympics bronze medallist, Gracehill girl Roseanne McGuckian (24.83) in fifth.

Also on Saturday, Annadale's Eddie McGinley (30:08.24) had to settle for silver in the 10,000m behind Mark Kenneally (29:21.63).

The 1500m titles went to Eoin Everard and Laura Crowe.

Kilkenny man Everard (3:44.58) pipped West Waterford's David McCarthy (3:44.73) in the men's race with John Coghlan (3:47.17) in third and northerners James O'Hare, Conor Bradley and Daniel Mooney fourth, fifth and seventh respectively.

With Jason Smyth not competing, Steven Colvert (21.13) pipped Marcus Lawler (21.15) to win Saturday's 200m but they were both surprised by David Hynes (10.64) in Sunday's 100m final.

Conor McCullough threw over 70m three times in the hammer competition with 70.75m his winning distance while Maria McCambridge warmed up for her marathon challenge at the World Championships by winning the 5000m in 15:55.44.

Walker Brendan Boyce was another Letterkenny medallist as he improved his 10K personal best by 14 seconds to take gold in 42:40.19