Triple delight for Hyland at Irish Open
By Stephen Leonard
BRENDAN Hyland chalked up three national titles at the Irish Open Swimming Championships in the NAC last week.
The Tallaght Swim Club star, who is pushing for Olympic qualification, retained his 200m Butterfly title on the opening day of competition.
He came home four seconds ahead of closest rival Calum Reid of Scotland, clocking 2:00.64.
And he followed that up with a second national title the following day when he contested the 400m Individual Medley, the 22-year-old competitor finishing in a time of four minutes and 29.87 seconds.
His third national prize came on the final day of the competition when he clocked 54.16 in the Men’s 100m Butterfly.
On top of that, Hyland combined with Conor Ferguson, Alex Murphy and Jordan Sloan for the IM relay in which they finished in a time of 3:42.39, leaving them 28th in the world.
It was a remarkable effort given that it was their first time to swim together and they will have another opportunity to break in among the top 16 on the final day of the European Championships next month.
Hyland will be among the Irish contingent aiming to make the Olympic cut individually as well at this event across channel.
Looking back on his Irish Open display, Hyland told The Echo “It was tough, but I was happy with my performance”
“I was coming off the back of a big block of training and I felt tired and quite sore at times, but I was happy with the way I performed” he added.
Also in action at the NAC last week was Templeogue swimmer Ellen Walshe who scooped the National Women’s 200m Butterfly title with a time of 2:17.42.
It was less than two seconds off overall race winner Tain Bruce from Scotland and leaves her in confident mood ahead of her trip to Hungary for the European Junior Champ-ionships from July 6-10.
Also attending that event will be Tallaght’s Antoinette Neamt and Niamh Coyne- the latter twice reaching the podium at last week’s nationals.
Indeed she finished runner-up in the Women’s 50m Breaststroke Final on the first day of competition before doing likewise over the 100m distance, clocking 1:12.28.
