Two new qualifiers for European Championships and National Junior Record A hot weekend on the Domestic front saw a number of world class performances as well as some breakthrough performances by some of our up and coming stars. The Cork City Sports as always threw up a number of exciting races and duels and the highlights of the day were Derval O’Rourke’s return to competition after a lay off due to injury since her fantastic World Indoor Championship gold medal in March. Derval opened her season equalling her national record and finishing second to a sharper Sarah Calxton. Derval will run again tonight in Athens and is looking forward to breaking that 12:96 national record has stood since 2003. Alistair Cragg returned to home soil and thrilled the crowd in a fantastic duel with Kenyans Rotich and Korir. The Clonliffe man finished third to the two, after fighting off flu during the week. Deirdre Ryan took the only Irish female victory at Cork in the High Jump, proving again that she is ‘back’ after battling an injury which kept her out of competition in 2005. Deirdre jumped 1:88 to win the competition, and came agonisingly close to a new National Record barely missing 1:92 on her second attempt. Paul Hession proved his return to form after a broken beginning to the season winning the men’s 200m in an impressive 20:78. Anna Boyle achieved a personal best and a Northern Ireland record for the 100m recording 11.49. Aoife Byrne who has shown consistent improvement throughout the season again broke her personal best and at the same time securing her qualification standard for the European Championships in Gothenburg this August. Aoife ran 4:12.47 well inside the 4:13.00 qualifier. Also to add to the qualification list is Thomas Chamney who after his recent 6th in the NCAA championships took a training spell in Barcelona to recover and prepare took a whopping 0.8 off his previous personal best running 1:46.82 and also securing his European Championship qualifier with ease. See European Championship qualification list) The national Junior and U23 championships saw a number of excellent performances, with Joanne Cuddihy after her impressive third in the Cork City Sports win the double in the 100m & 200m. Joanne will compete again tonight in Castleisland at the Riocht International Meeting. Kelly Proper (6:08) and Kalyn Sheehan (60.70), both took gold in their events in preparation for the World Junior Championships in Beijing in August. The wind did no favours to sprinters Amy Foster and Jason Smyth both chasing standards for the World Juniors by turning to a head wind by final time. Amy barely missed out on the standard in the heat running 11:93 (standard 11:90) but the headwind in the final meant there was little chance and she was satisfied taking the victory from youngster Niamh Whelan from Ferrybank who challenged her all the way. Jason Smyth had an impressive victory in the men’s 100m but will have to wait until next weekend in Mannheim to attempt the standard again. Juniors Mairead Murphy and Leona Byrne competed in the European Cup Combined Events in blistering heat in Monzon, Spain. Mairead bettered her National Record again to an impressive 5049 becoming the first Irish Junior ever to exceed the 5,000 mark after a gruelling weekend of top class performances. In addition to those reported earlier some splendid other results were posted including some fine long jumping by Eoin Hannon and middle distance running by Charlotte Ffrench O'Carroll at the junior and under 23 championships in Tullamore on Sunday. In the junior long jump Eoin Hannon ( 18 ) Tullamore jumped 7.09 ( -0.9 ) well ahead of his previous best of 6.88. To complete a good days work Eoin went straight to the hurdles and ran a personal best of 15.31 ( +0.8 ). Charlotte Ffrench O'Carroll, DSD who made such an impact with her 3000metres records in the Irish Schools' made a major impact over 1500 metres in a whopping new personal best of 4.30.41 to beat Roseanne Galligan, Newbridge ( first race back from injury ) in 4.32.06. Charlotte is clearly another huge talent from the DSD club. Another excellent win in the 400 metres hurdles in 53.64 by Chris Quinn, Lagan Valley underlines the potential of this fine athlete. The rich vein of 800 metres running continued in the junior men with Joe Warne winning a tight race from Eoin Healy and Conor Healy. Again Daire Bermingham emphasised his class with a 3.56.55 win in the 1500 metres from Brendan O'Neill running well again with 3.57.56.In the field events Laura Kerr had a fine javelin performance with 47.50 while in the junior shot Kieran McConnell threw 15.14.Good running also from Kevin Walsh in the 400 in 48.78 while Richie Corcoran was impressive in the 1500 under 23 in 3.53.56. Namur , Belgium last Thursday saw Paul McKee come back close to his best at 400 metres with 46.21 for a close 2nd place. while David McCarthy ran 47.23. Paul Brizzel had an excellent race in the 200 in 21.05 ( +1.5 ) while the ever improving Darragh graham ran 10.71 ( +1.3 ) for the 100 metres. Incidentally Darragh subsequently went on to record 21.60 ( -0.5 ) for 200 metres in Oordegem, Belgium on Saturday where at the same meeting Ian McDonald had a personal best in the 110 metres hurdles with 14.53 ( +0.9 ) To conclude Namur in the women's sprints ( no wind readings available ) Anna Boyle ran 11.52 for the 100 metres while in the 200 she ran 23.75 with Amy Foster on 24.50. Elaine McCaffrey ran 55.16 for the 400 metres. Derval O’Rourke, James Nolan and Roisin McGettigan will compete in the International meeting in Athens tonight. Lots of action will take place from the Riocht International Meeting in Castleisland, where Joanne Cuddihy will continue her flying form; Paul McKee after an excellent return to form in Belgium on Thursday where he ran 46.22; and Karen Shinkins will be in action among many more.