List of what Athletics Ireland is paying athletes...

drquirky

The following athletes have been selected by the Athletics Ireland Carding Selection Committee for the initial cash grants indicated below:
Robert Heffernan Podium (40k)
Fionnuala Britton World Class (20k)
Ciaran O’Lionaird International (12K)
Derval O’Rourke International (12K)
Jessie Barr International (12K)
Brian Gregan International (12K)
Laura Reynolds International (12K)
Brendan Boyce International (12K)
Mark English International (12K)
Paul Robinson International (12K)
Rose-Anne Galligan International (12K)

Might be opening a can of worms here but figured it is worth a thread…. Kind of depressing that there is only one distance runner on the list (plenty of middle distance) - Does anyone know if this is a shorter list than usual?

Pherekydes

Where's Thomas Barr?

drquirky

For comparison- here is the way USATF selects athletes for funding and places them into tiers….

http://www.usatf.org/groups/HighPerformance/Resources/tierCriteria.asp

Correct me if I'm wrong but it seems to me that the Athletics Ireland selection process is a hell of a lot less transparent?

notsofast

drquirky wrote: »

Kind of depressing that there is only one distance runner on the list (plenty of middle distance)

......and no field athletes

rom

Strange that the total pot for paralympic athletes is more. You would think the total pot should be on par.

Chivito550

rom wrote: »

Strange that the total pot for paralympic athletes is more. You would think the total pot should be on par.

Total pot should be less, not par. Far more difficult to reach the top of the Olympic world than the Paralympic world.

drquirky

rom wrote: »

Strange that the total pot for paralympic athletes is more. You would think the total pot should be on par.

Where you seeing that rom? Crazy if true.

Krusty_Clown

From here:
Athletics Ireland: €168k
Badmington Ireland: €36k
Boxing: €308k
Irish Canoe Union: €82k
Irish Clay Pigeon Shooting Association: €20k
Cycling Ireland: €208k
Irish Judo Association: €36k
Paralympic Athletics Ireland: €180k
Paralympic Swimming Ireland: €160k
Pentathlon Ireland: €32k
Rowing Ireland: €68k
Irish Sailing Association: €116k
Swim Ireland: €80k
Irish Table Tennis Association (Para): €80k
Triathlon Ireland: €64k

RacoonQueen

rom wrote: »

Strange that the total pot for paralympic athletes is more. You would think the total pot should be on par.

Yep, plenty of them getting €40,000 which I found a little odd.

Krusty_Clown

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Yep, plenty of them getting €40,000 which I found a little odd.

It's not really that odd. The Sports Council goes to great lengths to explain that:

For 2014 the main change is that Athletics Ireland, Swim Ireland and the Irish Sailing Association took over the management of the scheme for their athletes.

So the AAI is managing it's own carding this year. The Sports Council have set out criteria that says 'World Podium' gets €40k, 'World Class' standard gets €20k, 'International' standard gets €12k. I'd imagine its up to the AAI to determine which events qualify as world/international class etc. The Paralympic €40k carded athletes managed podium finishes at the Paralympic World Championships/Paralympic games.

YFlyer

Can Jason Smyth receive funding from more than one Government Body?

yizorselves

Depressing

Athletics total amount is not even half of Wayne Rooneys weekly pay. Oh I suppose thats his gross though...

Krusty_Clown

It's a pretty sad state of affairs indeed. What is the root cause though?

Is the criteria for carding just too stringent?
Are we just not strong enough from an international perspective at the moment to have more carded athletes?
Is the carding system not transparent enough?

Francie Barrett

Wow, pretty woeful salaries. At very least, I take it Athletics Ireland also covers expenses for athletes when competing in events, right?

plodder

The podium rule must be enormously beneficial to the paralympians given that there are so many more opportunities for getting on a podium there. if they are exploiting the rule, and other sports aren't losing out, then fair play to them. But, it wouldn't be fair if that wasn't the case.

TFBubendorfer

At the top end Ciarán Ó Lionáird has been cut from €20,000 to €12,000 despite winning 3000m bronze at the European Indoor Championships last year.
“Despite a Euro Indoor medal and fastest indoor 1500 in Europe in 2013, I’ve been cut by 40pc in @irishathletics funding,” a frustrated Ó Lionáird tweeted this afternoon.
“No words really.
“You wonder why kids in Ireland don’t want to do athletics? Medal and you’re cut. What does that tell young dreamers? Terrible message.”

From here: http://www.thescore.ie/irish-carding-2014-1316057-Feb2014/

Derval O’Rourke got the same treatment. Absolutely shocking.

mithril

I guess it comes down to what the purpose of the government funding high performance sport is ?

Is it simply to recognize excellence - and simply being ranked higher than 99.999% of other participants in your chosen sport on the planet would seem to be a valid criterion?

Or is it to enhance national prestige where medals would be more important?

Or is breaking down social exclusion a valid goal as well and possibly funding groups traditionally excluded from sport seen as a better use of scarce funds?

Tombo2001

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

It's not really that odd. The Sports Council goes to great lengths to explain that:
So the AAI is managing it's own carding this year. The Sports Council have set out criteria that says 'World Podium' gets €40k, 'World Class' standard gets €20k, 'International' standard gets €12k. I'd imagine its up to the AAI to determine which events qualify as world/international class etc. The Paralympic €40k carded athletes managed podium finishes at the Paralympic World Championships/Paralympic games.

Obviously takes no consideration whatsoever of how difficult it is to get onto a world podium from one sport to another.

Its shocking and galling to see Fionnuala Britton getting just a €20k grant; who has done more than her to fly the flag for Ireland from that list of sports. Maybe Robert Heffernan, but nobody else.

What we really need to see is top athletes like O'Lionaird saying "screw your 12 grand, I am just going to run races for prize money from now on, and I wont represent Ireland any more". Or even better, to run for Poland or Belgium or wherever he can qualify under the Grandmother rule.

walshb

What about Ireland's greatest athlete, Kelly Proper? Not being an international stinks!