Barry Keane

This is a big weekend for student-athletes on both sides of the Atlantic. The IUAA Track and Field and Multi-Events Championships draws a close to the Intervarsity schedule for the academic year and raises the curtain on the domestic track and field season.

The US season warms up ahead of championship events, with Irish collegiate and professional athletes competing at a number of big meetings, including some on the Continental Tour calendar.

Some athletes will open their outdoor seasons at home and abroad over the coming days, while a few, including Israel Olatunde, may even register their first result of 2026.

Intervarsities

Working out who will actually compete at IUAA events is not an exact science, but if the entry list is anything to go by, there could be some exciting match-ups in the men’s sprints, the women’s 5000m, and even some of the field events at this weekend's IUAA Track & Field Championships.

The chaos and unpredictability is part of the fun, and this year’s edition marks the 10th anniversary of the ‘From the Depths of Hell’ women’s 4x400m relay, which achieved worldwide recognition for Phil Healy’s maiden 400m run, and Cathal Dennehy and Ronan Duggan’s colourful commentary.

Three of the competitors in that race (Healy, Michelle Finn and Louise Shanahan) are now Olympians, and others, including Jenna Bromell, Ellie Hartnett and Kate Doherty, have won national senior medals. For a race not obviously big on quality (the winning time was outside 4 minutes), it was sure packed with potential.

Relive the drama here!

More recently, an epic tussle for last year’s women’s 1500m title heralded bigger things to come for its two main players. Eimear Maher, the eventual victor, went on to win bronze at the European U23 Championships last July, while Lucy Holmes, the race’s runner-up, won her first national senior title earlier this year.

Many on this year's entry list are likely to have been added in hope rather than anticipation, but among the emerging stars potentially looking to add themselves to the album of memorable Intervarsity moments are Michael Farrelly, Max O’Reilly, Craig Duffy and Colin Doyle in the sprints, Adam Nolan in the 110m hurdles, Fintan Dewhirst in the 400m hurdles and Conor Callinan in the Pole Vault.

The women’s field events could be of a very high standard. Nicola Tuthill is entered in the hammer while Anna Gavigan, who last weekend extended her personal best, is expected to compete in the women’s discus. The national indoor weight for distance winner, Kotryna Pacerinskaite, could compete in the shot put, hammer and weight for distance.

Greek triple-jumper Daphni Doulaptsi-Teeuwen will look to add further silverware in the horizontal jumps, Aoife O’Sullivan may be the clear favourite for the high jump, while Laura Frawley will be looking for further multi-event honours.

Ireland’s top two male javelin throwers are both entered. Conor Cusack was due to compete at the Spring Throws last weekend, but didn’t, and Oisin Joyce has been out with injury for more than a year, but an exciting battle between the UL and Lake District AC teammates could be on the cards if both make it to the startline. The two have won the last five national senior titles between them, but World Athletics lists no meeting between them. Even if it doesn’t happen this weekend, memorable Cusack-Joyce head-to-heads can’t be far off.

Others to look out for include Róise Roberts in the women’s 5000m and Aisling Lane and Oisin Lane in the walks.

Dublin City University have won the last seventeen overall team titles. University of Limerick, who finished second on 15 of those occasions, will be among those looking to end that streak.

The event is being hosted by MTU in Cork and those who can't make it in person can follow the action on the Athletics Ireland YouTube channel.

US Track and Field meetings

Diarmuid O’Connor is competing in the Mt. SAC Relays Combined Events, which started on Wednesday. O’Connor’s overnight score after five events is 3907, 162 points down on the same point in his personal best performance last April. He is lying in 13th place, in an event that holds World Combined Events Tour Silver (Cat B) status.

The Bryan Clay Invitational in Azusa, CA has become one of the leading distance meetings for college and emerging professional athletes. The extensive startlists include Ronan McMahon-Staggs, Oisín Ó Gailín, Mark Milner, Susie Nestor, Sarah Hosey, Eimear McCarroll and Claire Crowley in the 1500m. Ryan McCarthy, Roisin Treacy and Ailish Hawkins are entered for the 5000m, and Abdel Laadjel, Shay McEvoy, Dean Casey and Claragh Keane are due to race over 10,000m.

There will also be a strong distance representation at the Wake Forest Invitational in Winston-Salem, NC. Conall Rogers and Nathan Cremin are entered for the 800m, Emer McGlynn for the 1500m and Noah Harris, Grace Richardson and Heather Murphy over 5000m.

National record holder Israel Olatunde could open his 2026 account at the Tom Jones Memorial Invitational (Continental Tour Challenger) in Gainesville, FL where he is among the entries in the 100m. He hasn’t raced since running 10.08 in London at the end of August 2025. Conor Kelly (200m, 400m), Elizabeth Ndudi (Long Jump) and Daire Mahon (High Jump) are also among the entries.

Sean Aigboboh has had an incredible start to 2026, running 20.54 over 200m last weekend, and will race again over that distance at the Tom Tellez Invitational in Houston, TX. Fellow in-form sprinter Lauren Roy is entered for the 100m and 200m at the Joe Gillespie Invitational in Stephenville, TX.

Charlie O’Donovan (Mile) and David Davitt (400m) are on the startlist for the Paul Donahue Invite in Chester, PA, while Victoria Amiadamen (400m Hurdles) and Aoife Hernon (400m) are among the entries for the Mt. SAC Relays (Continental Tour Bronze).

A sprinkling of athletes will be competing at other meetings, most of which are not on the World Athletics calendar. You can find links to results for these meetings, and details of who is competing, on the TrackAthletes calendar.

Boston Marathon

Barry Keane is among the elite entries for Monday’s Boston Marathon. The Waterford AC athlete has completed two marathons to date, with his best performance of 2:11:31 coming at The Marathon Project in Arizona in December. Keane's half marathon PB of 1:01:22 hints at faster times to come at the longer distance.

While the World Indoor Championships are still a week away, there’s plenty at stake for Irish athletes over the coming days, with the European Throwing Cup taking place in Cyprus and the NCAA Indoor Championships in the USA.

While last year's medal bonanza will be difficult to repeat in Nicosia, there is still plenty for the Irish throwers to play for, and while NCAA medals are also difficult to come by, three Irish athletes carry record-breaking form into the weekend's decider.

Meanwhile, six recently crowned National Senior Indoor Champions will be among those looking to add National U20 and U23 titles to their collections.

European Throwing Cup

The 2025 trip to Nicosia was a memorable one for Irish throwers, with three athletes making the podium. Nicola Tuthill earned her third consecutive medal in the U23 Hammer, upgrading from silver in 2023 and 2024 to win gold. Anna Gavigan threw a then PB of 53.91m to win silver in the U23 Discus, while 2024 World U20 medallist Oisin Joyce won bronze in the U23 Javelin.

Gavigan will compete again in the U23 Discus, and will look to at least match her performance from last year.

Tuthill went on to win silver at both the European U23 Championships and the World University Games before making the World Championship in Tokyo last year. She will seek to be competitive among Europe’s best senior hammer throwers here, in preparation for the European Championships in Birmingham this summer.

Niamh Fogarty broke the forty-year-old national discus record when she threw 58.40, in Oklahoma last April, and will look to improve on her 15th place from last year. Eric Favors, like Fogarty, is a regular on the Irish team for this event, and will be hoping for a big throw to set his outdoor campaign alight.

Conor Cusack made big strides in the Javelin last summer, ending the season with a PB of 75.42m. He will hope to carry that momentum into 2026, when he takes part in the senior Javelin competition for the first time.

Tuthill has already secured the qualification standard for the European Championships in Birmingham later this summer. Favors has surpassed the Athletics Ireland B standard, and is sitting well within the quota spots on ranking; indeed, his best is just 5cm short of the automatic qualification standard.

The respective Athletics Ireland B standards and the collection of ranking points will be at the forefront of Fogarty and Cussack’s minds in the coming months. Fogarty’s national record is better than the Athletics Ireland B standard of 57.80m, the minimum she would need to make her first major championships.

Cussack would need to improve to at least 79.00m to have any chance of making the cut-off for Birmingham, but given his improvement in the past 12 months, that is looking ever more possible.

NCAA battles

The startlists for the NCAA Division I Championships in Arkansas (Fayetteville) on Friday and Saturday will include five Irish athletes, including two who have also been selected for the World Indoor Championships next weekend.

Lauren Roy, who has been in scintillating form this season, will compete in the 60m and 200m. Roy has improved to 7.19 over 60m – the distance she will contest in Torun – this season and her 22.89 over 200m places her 2nd on the Irish all-time list, indoors and overall, behind Rhasidat Adeleke.

Maeve O’Neill has been another surprise package in early 2026, breaking the Irish Indoor 800m record last month and earning herself a spot at the World Indoors. She has improved her outright PB by 2.33 seconds this year and is ranked sixth on times this season heading into the weekend decider.

Elizabeth Ndudi is another to have set an Irish record this indoor season, when she added 1cm to Kelly Proper's 2010 mark. Ndudi is ranked fourth on 2026 performances, but with little to choose between the 16 contestants, this one could go down to the wire.

Abdel Laadjel had a fabulous run to finish top 10 at the NCAA Cross Country Championships in November, and he will be in the mix when the 5000m title is contested on Friday.

Seán Donoghue, a regular on successful Villanova middle-distance relay teams, is among the names listed for their Distance Medley Relay team this weekend.

The NCAA Division II and NCAA Division III championships will also be contested this weekend. Louis O’Loughlin (Mile), Ava O’Connor (Mile, 3000m) and Claragh Keane (5000m) will compete at the Division II event in Virginia Beach, VA, while Lucas Fadden (60m, 200m) is among the qualifiers for the Division III event in Birmingham, AL.

The NAIA Championships – the other division of collegiate competition in the US - took place last weekend. Nathan Cremin won gold in the 1000m (2:22.26) while Heather Murphy won silver in the 5000m (16:24.40).

U20 and U23 athletes compete for national titles

National senior champions Sean Doggett, Michael Kent, Adam Nolan, Emmanuel Osas, Meabh Corkery and Kotryna Pacerinskaite will be among those competing for age-group medals in Athlone on Saturday.

Doggett, who is the fastest Irish man over 400m in 2026 will race over 200m (U23), while Kent, the national Pole Vault champion, will compete in the U20 Long Jump. Osas will again contest the High Jump and Nolan the 60m Hurdles, both at U23 level, while Coakery will look to continue her steady improvement in the U20 Pole Vault. Pacerinskaite, the national Weight for Distance champion, is entered for both that and the Shot Put this weekend.

The U20 women’s middle-distance races look stacked with talent, and are likely to be closely-contested affairs, but there is a strong entry right across the programme, and an exciting day of action is guaranteed. See the Athletics Ireland website for a full preview.

Lynch on the roads of New York

Former Irish marathon record holder Peter Lynch will continue his preparations for next month’s London Marathon when he takes to the NYC Half startline on Sunday. This will be Lynch’s first serious test since finishing 24th at the World Championships in September.

Even with a potential six spots available, it’s likely that the competition for the Irish places in the men’s marathon in Birmingham will be hotly contested.

Fearghal Curtin and Paul O’Donnell have already secured the Automatic Qualification standard, and Ryan Creech, who just missed that standard in Seville last month, is comfortably within the quota spaces. Lynch, National Champion David McGlynn, Barry Keane and Hiko Tonosa, also have the Athletics Ireland B standard, the minimum needed for selection.

Later this month, the Irish team will head to the European Cross Country in Lagoa, Portugal, with serious medal aspirations. The marathon runners will look to further impress in what has already been a historic year for the Irish men on the roads.

And the indoor season will get underway both in Ireland and for US-based college athletes Stateside. The national walks championships will take place in Raheny. And with the Southern Hemisphere track season about to start, there’s even a chance that Irish athletes will compete on all surfaces this month.
 

Euro Cross Country Championships

The European Cross Country Championships in Lagoa, Portugal, will provide a final opportunity for Ireland to extend the record championship medal haul of 2025. In addition to the individual contenders, there are particularly strong teams in the U23 men’s race, the senior men’s race and the mixed relay.

Both the women’s U23 senior women’s teams are loaded with experience and will look to improve on their fifth and tenth, respectively, in Antalya.

Brian Fay, Cormac Dalton and Niamh Allen have all previously finished in the top 10 in the senior races, and will be looking to repeat their performances from 2021, 2023 and 2024 respectively.

Nick Griggs will be looking for a fourth individual medal at this event, and Anna Gardiner will be competing in the U20 women’s race for a fourth consecutive time. Her best finish was seventh in Brussels two years ago.

The Irish team ended a three-edition medal drought when the event was last held in Portugal in 2019, winning two individual and two team medals. There has been at least one Irish medal at each edition since, and the 34-member team will travel to Lagoa optimistic of continuing that streak.

Field-a-Team: Lagoa will be launched closer to the event, and check back next week for dedicated preview articles.
 

A couple of marathons

Fearghal Curtin, who smashed the Irish marathon record when winning the Gyeongju marathon in October, is back in action on Sunday. He’s unlikely to be such a low-key participant this time around.

After a less-than-perfect debut in Boston earlier this year, Barry Keane is making his second attempt at the distance at The Marathon Project in Arizona on 21 December. He’ll be hoping to deliver himself a big personal best in time for Christmas.
 

Big weekend of US College action

The coming weekend will see some of the distance athletes attempt to transfer cross country form onto the track, with the first of the Boston University meetings (Sharon Colyear-Danville Season Opener) taking place. Abdel Laadjel, who recently finished 9th at the NCAA Div I Cross Country Championships, is among the elite entries for the 5000m there.

Laadjel ran his outright PB of 13:29.79 at the same event last year. The Irish indoor record is Andrew Coscoran's 13:12.56 from January 2024. Several other Irish athletes are entered across the 3000m and 5000m races.

Others are likely to compete at some of the dozens of college meetings taking place on the last busy weekend pre-Christmas.
 

Domestic action

The NIA Live series of indoor events gets underway on 3rd December with 60 races scheduled across just four hours, including M80 and W40 4 x 400 WR attempts. NIA Live meeting two on 17th December is expected to include competitive elite 3000m races for men and women; a strong women’s 1000m; and a potential sub-four attempt in the men’s mile.

December is also a big month for the domestic road race scene. Several athletes who just missed out on Euro Cross selection, along with some track athletes testing their endurance, are entered for the Jingle Bells 5k in the Phoenix Park on Saturday 6th.

The World Race Walking Tour will come to Dublin on 14th December. This Bronze-level event will incorporate the Irish 20km Racewalking Championships.

There are a few talented athletes entered for the National Novice Cross Country Championships which will be held alongside the uneven age juvenile Championships in Dublin on Sunday 7th.
 

All this should warm fans up nicely for 2026 and all that it might hold.

The week got off to a good start, with Mark English breaking the 800m National Record in Budapest on Tuesday, while Darragh McElhinney moved to 5th on the Irish all-time list for 3000m at the same meeting.

The final dash for world ranking points and qualification spots is heating up, with just 10 days to grab one of those quota spots (or, hang on to one, depending on your point of view) or post an automatic qualification spot.

Those who have long had the qualification standards, but who’ve raced sparingly, will be looking for competition sharpness over the coming weeks. 

And with relay spots on the line, Irish 400m athletes will be looking to prove their fitness over the coming days.

Diamond League

Sarah Healy has finished in the top three in four of her five Diamond League appearances so far this year, and she’ll again be looking for a confidence-boosting run at the Silesia Diamond League on Saturday.

An Irish record time would do that nicely, but racing well against some of her rivals for Tokyo glory may be more important as she targets her first global outdoor final.

The event will be shown live on Virgin Media Two and Virgin Media Play from 3-5pm.

CITIUS meeting

Sarah Lavin will race the 100m hurdles at the CITIUS meeting in Bern, Switzerland (Continental Tour Silver) on Saturday. 12.88 or faster would wrap up European Championship qualifiication for next year, and that's at least the sort of time Sarah will be looking to better as she builds towards Tokyo.

European Athletics will be streaming the event on their website from 4pm.

Belgian encore

Continental Tour meetings in Belgium have provided many breakthrough performances for Irish athletes over the year. And some will be hoping that Leuven, which hosts Meeting voor Mon on Saturday, will too see breakthrough performances for them.

The men’s 400m entries include Jack Raftery, Cillín Greene, Chris O'Donnell, Joe Doody, Callum Baird and Andrew Egan, while Aaron Keane is entered in the 200m and 300m.

The women’s 400m entries include Lauren Cadden, Arlene Crossan and Cliodhna Manning, though Cadden is also entered for Stratford on Sunday.

Laura Nicholson is currently just a few points short of a quota spot for Tokyo in the 1500m. A  top-three finish in 4:08 or faster, may be good enough to see her to her first major senior championships.

Nick Griggs is entered for the 1500m, where running sub 3:33.00 and bagging the Auto Q appears to be his only remaining opportunities to make Tokyo this year (unless he can get added to the Lausanne Diamond League 5000m). The Auto Q for Birmingham next year is 3:33.50.

Shane Bracken, Seán Donoghue and Philip Marron look to continue their strong seasons, also over 1500m. Callum Morgan, fresh from a 13:23.37 PB over 5000m is also entered for the 1500m, where he could become the 14th Irish man to run sub-3:40 this season.

Others looking for a dream climax to their season include Robert McDonnell (200m), Emma Moore (800m) and David Cussen (High Jump).

There is a free livestream which starts at 2pm.

Stratford speed

A number of Irish athletes are entered for the penultimate Stratford Speed meeting of the year, though it’s likely that not all will race.

While all of Ireland’s top 400m men will be in Belgium on Saturday, it appears that the female battle for possible Tokyo relay spots is split between there and east London. Kelly McGrory, who opened her season in Oordegem last week, the ever-improving Kate Doherty, and the aforementioned Lauren Cadden are among the entries.

Bori Akinola, Marcus Lawler, Paul Costelloe, Michael Farrelly, Sean Aigboboh, Molly Scott, Ciara Neville, Sarah Leahy, Ruby Millet and Orla Comerford are among the entries over the shorter distances.

There will be a free livestream.

Elsewhere

Phil Healy (400m), Michael Healy (Discus) and Seán Mockler (Hammer) are among the entries for the Leevale Open Sports on Sunday.

Barry Keane is among the entries for the Falmouth Road Race (7 miles) on Sunday.

The National Senior Championships will get August started, and the Diamond League final will draw it to a close. The European U20 Championships will take place in Tampere (Finland) from 7th to 10th, and athletes not yet guaranteed their spot in Tokyo will be making a last-ditch effort to pick up ranking points and achieve standards before the close of the qualification window later this month.

National Championships

The Irish Senior National Championships will be held in Santry stadium on 2nd and 3rd August. Irish titles are always highly coveted, and some exciting racing is guaranteed. We’ve highlighted elsewhere some of the events and athletes to look out for.

Both days of the National Championships will be shown live on the Athletics Ireland Youtube channel. The 100m, 400m, 800m and 1500m track finals will be shown live on RTÉ 2 from 5:00-7:30pm on Sunday evening.

Diamond Leagues

While the season may feel like it’s drawing to a close, there are still regular-season Diamond League events in Silesia (16th August), Lausanne (20th August) and Brussels (22nd August), as well as the final in Zurich on 27th and 28th of August.

Startlists are not yet available for any of these events, but we know that Sarah Healy has already done enough to qualify for the final in the 1500m and that she will race both that and the Silesia meeting. She has had an outstanding year already, and has picked up four top-three finishes in the earlier meetings this season.

Diamond League events are shown on Virgin Media.

European U20 Championships

A very strong Irish team will head to Tampere in the coming days for the European U20 Championships. Conor Kelly and the men’s 4x400m relay team, both at the top of the 2025 European U20 rankings, are among those with medal aspirations.

Sean Doggett (400m) and Cormac Dixon (3000m, 5000m) and others will be looking for top 8 finishes. Ireland have qualified teams in all four relays, ensuring that many athletes will be exposed to competition at this level for the first time.

All sessions of the championship will be shown live and on demand on Eurovision Sport.

Continental Tour Meetings

The penultimate Continental Tour gold of the 2025 season, the Gyulai István Memorial/Hungarian Athletics Grand Prix will take place in Budapest on 12th August. Among the world starts announced to date are Femke Bol, Mondo Duplantis and Miltiádis Tentóglou. While it’s not yet known if any Irish athletes will be joining them, this promises to be one of the best meetings of the year. Continental Tour Gold meetings tend to be shown on the World Athletics streaming platform.

The Continental Tour silver meetings in Banská Bystrica (Slovakia) on 8th August and Bern (Switzerland) on 16th August, will offer final opportunities for athletes to boost their Road to Tokyo rankings before the end of the qualification window. We’ll update these meetings with Irish athletes if and when any are named on the startlists.

IFAM Oordegem (Belgium) on 9th August (Continental Tour Bronze) promises to be a busy one for Irish athletes, and may be a last-chance opportunity for some to make the team for Tokyo. Nick Griggs, Darragh McElhinney, Efrem Gidey, Jack O’Leary, Cormac Dalton and Roisin Flanagan are all entered for 5000m. Shane Bracken and Seán Donoghue are listed for the 1500m, while Cian McPhillips, Emma Moore and Alex O’Neill are all down for the 800m. Athletes entered for the 400m include Jack Raftery, Cillín Greene, Chris O’Donnell, Cliodhna Manning, Arlene Crossan and Kelly McGrory.

The final BMC Grand Prix (Continental Tour Challenger) will be held at Trafford on 9th August and is likely to feature Irish athletes.

Among the current entries for the Continental Tour Challenger Meeting voor Mon in Belgium on 16 August are Chris O’Donnell (200m, 400m), Lauren Cadden (400m), and Nick Griggs and Shanee Bracken (1500m).

Other events

Irish athletes will be looking for fast times, big jumps and long throws, and to make the most of late-season form, at a number of meetings in the UK over the coming weeks. With the qualification window now open for next summer’s European Championships in Birmingham, there’s still much to play for.

Indeed, entries for the Northern Ireland and Ulster Senior (open) Championships include a number of athletes who’ll be looking to make the Northern Ireland team for Birmingham. Kate O’Connor and Anna McCauley have both already secured the consideration standard in the heptathlon. O’Connor is entered for the 200m and 100m hurdles while McCauley is due to compete in the long jump and 100m hurdles.

Other notable entries include Sean Aigboboh (100m), Callum Baird (100m, 200m), Orla Comerford (100m, 200m), Sarah Leahy (100m), Rachel McCann (200m), Lauren Callaghan (Long Jump), John Kelly (Shot Put) and Anna Gavigan (Discus Throw).

The Stratford Speed meetings have been a happy hunting ground for Irish athletes in search of fast times, and it was at the August edition of last year’s series that Israel Olatunde set the national 100m record. Early entries for that event this year (17 August) include Olatunde, along with Michael Farrelly, Sean Aigboboh, Molly Scott, Ciara Neville and Sarah Leahy.

Ireland’s top pole vaulters this season – Conor Callinan and Clodagh Walsh – are both among the Irish entries for the Vault Manchester Summer Series meeting on 6th August.

A number of Irish athletes broke personal bests at the British Milers Club Record Breakers meeting at Tooting Bec last year, and some may return for mid-week action there on 20th August.

Two big half marathons towards the end of the month will herald the start of the autumn road racing season. The Antrim Coast Half Marathon in Larne on 24th August is attracting some of the biggest global names in endurance running with Greffory Kamworor and Joshua Cheptegei among those expected to start. Less than a week later, the National Half Marathon Championships will take place in Tullamore. Both races should feature strong domestic fields.

Before then, Peter Lynch, Barry Keane & Fearghal Curtin, three of Ireland's top road runners, are due to compete at the Beach to Beacon 10km in Cape Elizabeth (USA) on Saturday 2nd August.

If the fresh new leaves appearing everywhere, the birds’ endless chirruping and the clear blue skies aren't enough to remind you that spring is upon us, then one look at the marathon schedule over the coming weeks surely will.

And there is much to look forward to on the marathon front from an Irish perspective, especially on the men's side. Hopefully the good weather lasts too.

Road season has already started

Paul O’Donnell will have surprised many when he dropped a 2:10:17 marathon debut at the end of March, and while that was 17 agonising seconds outside the Athletics Ireland B standard for Tokyo, it will give hope to others making their marathon debut in the coming weeks. 

Fearghal Curtin finished 5th at the Berlin Half Marathon on Sunday; his 1:01:12 finishing time puts him sixth on the Irish all-time list and within sight of the Irish record of 1:00:51 currently shared by Efrem Gidey and Hiko Tonosa Haso.

Peter Lynch, who ran a 1:01:15 half marathon in January, broke the Irish 10-mile record on Sunday (45.59), and has just missed the Irish 15km record twice in recent weeks.

Just a taster for things to come, perhaps.

Who is racing which marathon

Hiko Tonosa, the current national record holder who ran 2:09:42 when finishing third at the Dublin Marathon in October, will race Rotterdam this Sunday (13 April).

How to follow Rotterdam Marathon

Barry Keane, who has a half marathon personal best similar to Curtin and Lynch, will be making his marathon debut in Boston on 21 April.

How to follow Boston Marathon

Curtin and Lynch are due to take on Düsseldorf Marathon on 27 April. It will be Curtin’s first attempt at the distance, while Lynch will be looking to improve on his debut in Chicago last October.

How to follow Düsseldorf Marathon

David McGlynn, another to make big half marathon improvements this spring, races Hamburg on 27 April.

How to follow Hamburg Marathon

Former National record holder Stephen Scullion is due to race Copenhagen on 11 May.

How to follow Copenhagen Marathon

What they might be targeting

While it is not clear what each athletes is targeting - in terms of times and championships - these are just some of the significant marks they may have in mind as they complete the final days and weeks of training:

O'Donnell's recent performance suggests that the Irish All-time top list is due a major revision. Here's how it currently looks:

2:09:42 Hiko Tonosa
2:09:49 Stephen Scullion
2:09:56 John Treacy
2:10:09 Kevin Seaward
2:10:17 Paul O’Donnell
2:10:25 Paul Pollock
2:10:54 Mark Carroll
2:11:30 John Woods
2:12:19 Dick Hooper
2:12:20 Jerry Kiernan

The Road to Tokyo maths

Tonosa is the only Irish athlete who currently has the Athletics Ireland B standard for the event. His record-breaking marathon performance from Dublin last October and record-equalling half marathon run in Seville are good enough to rank him 62nd on the Road to Tokyo (there are 100 marathon places for World Championships).

While there are a number of marathons between now and the close of qualification (4 May), it’s unlikely that 38 athletes would run fast enough and gain enough points to push Tonosa outside the quota.

Barring disaster, we’ll see Tonosa in Tokyo in September.

Hiko’s Road to Tokyo score:
Dublin Marathon: 2:09:42 (1136 points) +plus 1st in National Championships (45 points) = 1181
Seville Half Marathon: 1:00:51 (1152 points) + 0 placing points = 1152
Average = 1166

Without earning placing points, Tonosa would need to run 2:08:46 or faster in Rotterdam to improve his Road to Tokyo score. A top 8 finish would add some placing points, from 60 for a win to 15 for 8th place. Anything better than 8th place with 2:09:35 or faster would see him adding some points to his current score.

Curtin, Lynch and Keane are not currently on the Road to Tokyo rankings, but their recent half marathon performances are worth 1138, 1136 and 1132 points respectively.

The current quota cut-off for Tokyo is 1103 points, though the points needed are likely to be higher come May. 80th place is currently 1137 points.

If Curtin or Lynch run the 2:10:00 B standard in Düsseldorf, which they need to be considered for selection, then their Road to Tokyo scores would be 1134 and 1133 respectively. These points would place them within the top 85 as things currently stand. Düsseldorf is a Cat F race, so even a win would only add an additional 5 points.

As a downhill course, Boston is not record eligible (and therefore not eligible for standards), so Keane's possible route to Tokyo is a bit more complicated. The top 5 finishers at any of the marathon majors, including Boston, are considered to have achieved the Auto Q, irrespective of the time.

Beyond that, the performance points are adjusted based on the rate of drop. Keane would therefore need to run much faster than 2:10 to get the points it would earn him on a non-downhill course. And even if he does run considerably faster, it's not clear where he'd stand in terms of achieving the B standard.

David McGlynn already has a Road to Tokyo ranking, but is well outside the quota sports. His Half Marathon PB from Barcelona is worth 1084 points, and if he was to run the Athletics Ireland B standard in Hamburg, he would have a total score of 1107 points, just inside the current quota cutoff.

The Copenhagen Marathon is outside the qualification window for Tokyo, so Scullion can't qualify for Tokyo. Given that Paul O'Donnell's time from last month was outside the Athletics Ireland B standard, unless he tries again, he can't be selected.

Tokyo may come a little too soon for most of these guys, but there's clearly some marathon momentum building ahead of LA in 2028.

Please do let us know if there are others we should be keeping track of.