What happened to Irish middle distance running?

...was just thinking about the Ballycotton 1987 analysis and that whole era of Irish athletics. It came 2 years after O'Sullivan, Flynn, O'Meara and Coghlan broke the 4x1 mile record, just before Sonia emerged.

Was that just an exceptional group? Could it happen again where a group of runners come through in the same decade to do well internationally? Or do we overstate their ability, after all the 4x1 mile was possibly not a very popular event, not many remember the Wanamaker Mile, and Coghlan's gold came in the first World Championship that wasn't necessarily the strongest field. Have we just suffered, like many European countries, from the impact of the surge from Africa? Is athletics on the wane, chronically underfunded and overlooked? Has the traditional Irish respect for local runners just suffered from the emergence of other sports?

Sacksian

For context, without going into the reasons, the all-time lists shows that as the distances get shorter, our male athletes are improving more against their historical counterparts.

5000m - 2 of the top 10 performances are post 2000, Alistair Cragg and Cathal Lombard (!).
3000m - 1 of the top 10 performances is post 2000, and that was Alistair Cragg, so we can’t take too much credit for that.
Mile - 3 of the top 10 performances are post 2000 (Mark Carroll, Ciarán Ó Lionaird and James Nolan)
1500m - 4 of the top 10 performances are post 2000 - (Ciarán Ó Lionaird, Mark Carroll, Paul Robinson and James Nolan)
800 - 6 of the top 10 performances are post 2000 (Mark English, Thomas Chamney, Dave Campbell, Paul Robinson, James Nolan, David McCarthy.
400m - 7 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
200m - 7 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
100m - All 10 of the top 10 performances are post 2000

It is surprising (to me) have few inroads the men have made into the all-time list at 3000m and 5000m compared to our sprinters. There’s no athletic reason why our best runners of today cannot outperform our own athletes of 20 years ago.

The picture for the women is, overall, much better than for the men (especially at 5000m and up) and I suspect we’ll be looking at mostly post-2000 marks in the 1500m/mile/3000m in one or two years.

5000m - 8 of the top 10 performances are post 2000.
3000m - 4 of the top 10 performances is post 2000
Mile - 4 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
1500m - 5 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
800m - 7 of the top 10 performances are post 2000 and 5 are in the last 5 years (Rose-Anne Galligan, Ciara Mageean, Laura Crowe, Ciara Everard and Siofra Cleirigh-Buttner).
400m - 6 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
200m - 9 of the top 10 performances are post 2000
100m - 9 of the top 10 performances are post 2000

OWinter

I would argue the sprints records were soft going into the naughties and the middle to longer distance records much stronger peppered with stars like Coughlan, Marcus O'Sullivan, John Treacy and others

In terms of women's records it's exactly as I would have expected. Historically women have been wrongly denied sporting opportunities and it's only as we've entered the Late 90s and 2000's that more equal participation has been a reality

Reading this though there is obviously still a very long way to go in terms of true equality

http://m.independent.ie/sport/soccer/international-soccer/sharing-tracksuits-and-getting-changed-in-toilets-irish-womens-team-hit-out-at-fai-in-revealing-press-conference-35592523.html

walshb

Taking the mile outdoors, the top three are all very close to each other. Sub 3 50 is truly legendary in my view, and only two Irish men ever did it. Of the best ten I think only one athlete could be called young, COL. The other 9 times are all the older generation. These times should be improving, but they are really excellent times that were posted. Very few younger men appearing in the top lists at 1 mile.

Maybe back in the 70s and 80s and 90s more men wanted to be athletes...