Coscoran misses out but a second chance beckons
Disappointed Irish athletes now go into repechage
The Olympics. Don't you just love them - or maybe hate them.
They can bring so much joy to those who do well but plenty of heartbreak too.
Years of preparation can come down to literally a few seconds of concerted action.
You wait and wait in the Olympic Village to get involved then when you take part in your sport there is no guarantee everything will go as you hoped or planned. It's life. The sporting life.
The track and field part of the 2024 Games got up and running in Paris this morning and one of those taking part was Andrew Coscoran who, of course, is a member of the Star of the Sea club near Stamullen.
He was involved in one of the heats of the 1500m and clocked 3:42.07.
However, unlike at the Tokyo Olympics Coscoran didn't qualify for the semi-finals - but, wait, all is not lost.
Because a repechage system has been introduced to athletes in this Olympics the Star of the Sea athlete can still qualify for the next round.
The 1500m got Ireland's athletics campaign off to start but the three Irish runners involved - Luke McCann, Bettystown's Cathal Doyle and Coscoran - did not spark. With the top six qualifying from each heat they all missed out.
The one consolation for them is that there is that back-door opportunity still there but they have to take the chance offered to them, something, of course, every other athlete involved will be thinking. The repechage takes place on Saturday evening, 6.15pm Irish time.
It was a disappointing run from Coscoran in the third heat as he never got going and was left trailing during the final lap.
He had reason to be hopeful going into the race as he has really progressed as an athlete in recent years with some notable achievements chalked up.
In August 2022, Coscoran (who is from Balbriggan but has ran for the Star of the Sea club in Meath since he was a youngster) qualified for the final of the 1500 m event at the 2022 European Athletics Championships held in Munich, Germany, where he finished ninth.
On 25th February 2023, the Coscoran broke Marcus O'Sullivan's 35-year-old Irish indoor 1500m record with a time of 3:33:49 for third at the World Tour Indoor final in Birmingham. He was also 0.01 seconds inside Ray Flynn's national outdoor mark from 1982.
In July 2023, Coscoran reduced his own Irish record to 3:30.42 at the Diamond League event in Silesia. Selected for the 1500m at the 2023 World Athletics Championships, he reached the semi-finals..
In January this year, the Star of the Sea man ran a new Irish 5000m national record of 13:12.56 in Boston, Massachusetts. It looked like he was on track.
Now, everything as far as these Olympic Games are concerned, depend on how he, and his colleagues, fares out in the second chance saloon, the repechage.