Irish Combined Events Team Set for Madeira Challenge

A team of three Irish athletes will travel to the European Combined Events Cup in Ribeira Brava (Madeira), Portugal. The competition, previously to be held in Donetsk, will take place over two days on 5-6 July 2014. 

Irish athletes Shane Aston (Trim A.C), Kourosh Fouroughi (Star of the Sea A.C) and Michael Bowler (Kilkenny A.C) will be competing in the men’s decathlon event. They will be competing as a team in the 2nd League.

All three athletes have competed against each other before, trading championship wins between them, most recently Fouroughi winning the Varsities Championships and Bowler winning the Irish National Indoor Championships.

In 2013 National Junior Champion Aston improved his Junior Decathlon total at the Scottish National Championships to 6136 and will look to push it up further in the coming championship. In his first senior championship in Antwerp, Belgium, Aston set an impressive score of 5899 to come seventh in the Flanders Cup.   

Michael Bowler most recently this season set a national leading score of 6342 at the Icelandic Under 23 Combined Events Championships.

Fouroughi moving from a successful international high jump career will be competing in his first major international combined event championships.

Four athletes are allowed to compete in the men’s decathlon. The scores of each athlete from the same country will be added together to create a total score, with the lowest man’s being deducted from the total. Medals will also be awarded in the individual competition. 

Team manager for the event will be National Combined Event Co-ordinator Kieron Stout