Rio ’16: The standards

With the A and B system gone, the most surprising aspect of these qualification standards are the marathon marks: 2:17 for men and 2:42 for women. Very soft – compared to, say, the 10,000m mark of  28 mins for men and 32 mins 15 secs for women. By contrast, the IAAF qualfiying marks for the World Championships in Beijing later this year are  2:18 for men and 2:44 for women,  although Athletics Ireland has set the marks higher at at 2:15.30 and 2:33.30.

The Rio ’16 men’s javelin mark at 83m is also very high – though maybe we have become too accustomed to the 60m mark aspired to by most Irish spear chuckers. More later.