Ballinasloe's Brassil misses out on final place
Sive Brassil from Ballinasloe has just come up short in her quest to make the Modern Pentathlon final in the European Games in Poland, finishing her semi-final in 15th place.
Brassil began her semi-final day of competition in the fencing bonus round. Based on the results of the ranking round yesterday (Monday), each of the athletes went head-to-head in a knockout formation. Brassil was up fifth in the fencing and lost out to Anna Jurt from Switzerland.
Moving to the pool, the former Our Lady’s Bower student lined up in the first heat of the 200m freestyle swim. Finishing third in her heat put Brassil into 14th position going into the Laser Run.
Pushing hard through the first half of the run, Brassil picked up some places, running in 12th position, but after a number of shooting misses in the penultimate lap, Brassil slipped back into 17th position.
Pulling through the final lap, the Ballinasloe athlete climbed up one place to 16th, but it wasn’t enough to make it through with only the top nine athletes progressing to the final on Thursday.
The top eight placed nations in that final secure Olympic qualification so Brassil was understandably disappointed not to have made it when she spoke afterwards.
“It’s not where I wanted to be. I wanted to be in the top nine going into that final on Saturday so I’m really disappointed. I struggled a lot yesterday in the fencing and I just found it really hard today to find my form, so yeah it just wasn’t the competition I wanted,” said Brassil.
“It wasn’t the result that I wanted at all but a lot of my process was good and I’ve learnt a lot from the competition so I’ll go home now with my coaches and my team and we’ll work towards the next the next competition and the next season and try and build from here," Sive added.
Modern Pentathlon summary
Fencing Bonus Round semi-finals: Sive Brassil (Ireland) beaten by Anna Jurt (Switzerland).
200m Freestyle Swim semi-finals: Sive Brassil, 2:17.03, started Laser Run in 14th place.
Laser Run semi-finals: Sive Brassil, 16th in 11:43.20, does not advance to the final.