Kiltoom starlet Sionann selected on Triathlon national talent programme

Kiltoom girl Sionann O'Reilly Collins will be part of the Triathlon Ireland National Talent Programme 2010, along with ten other athletes from around the country. Athletes will attend Regional camp one day a month and every second month athletes will attend a National Training Camp. They will also be provided with individual coaching, sports science support, performance tracking, athlete profiling and continual development. All athletes on the talent confirmation squad will have performance reviews at regional level and with the national coaching staff and personal coach. One of Sionann's aims for 2010 will be to compete in the 2010 European Triathlon championships that will be hosted by Athlone. Sionann is hoping to join the Drum Clonown Athletics club to improve on her running as this is her weakest discipline, even though she made it to four All-Ireland running finals this year (three cross 2k country plus one track and field 1500m). Michael Lane from Athlone Community College had a large part to play in this with his coaching and encouragement. Sionann is beginning to enjoy the endurance sport and enjoying the longer distances in swimming. At a previous Triathlon Ireland camp in December, she started off with a session at 6am covering 8.5km after a rest they took off on a forest run. This was no gentle run through a forest - it was a 12km endurance test with steep inclines organised by coaches Mark Dempsey and Oliver Harkin. The following day Sionann had another 8km swim training session and a core strengthening session. The 14-year-old then competed in Galway at the Connacht Championships in the girls under-16 400m, 200m and 50m Freestyle plus the 50m Backstroke, taking personal bests in all. She was also in the 50m the relay team that took silver in the 200m Freestyle. This is the minimum expected and Sionann will have to increase the running if she is going to make the European Triathlon championships in Athlone in June. Sionann is now looking forward to a short rest before the schools swimming gala early in January, although swim coach Johnny Powell threw in a three-day session in Limerick over the holidays. Also in December, Sionann competed in an International fencing competition at DCU in Dublin, where she didn't get placed but held her own against 20 and 30 year-olds. This rounded off an excellent year where she represented Ireland twice in Modern Pentathlon at the European championships in Portugal and UK championships in London. She was also on the winning Irish Tetrathlon team in Bedale, beating the top English Scottish and Welsh teams. She took a first in the All Ireland modern pentathlon Youth C and a school team Gold in the Connacht Cross Country finals. She also finished fourth as an individual in the Tetrathlon Nationals and took a team third. Sionann also won various medals in swimming and took a Bronze in the West of Ireland Irish Federation Fencing Open in Galway. Her interest in sport all started off when she first moved to Athlone and took swimming lessons from Johnny Powell.