women in sport

Elizabeth Ndudi becomes Ireland’s first ever field champion at Euro U20 championships

Published 10:05 10 Aug 2023 BST

Updated 10:15 10 Aug 2023 BST

Elizabeth Ndudi becomes Ireland’s first ever field champion at Euro U20 championships

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Elizabeth Ndudi is the European U20 Long Jump champion.

The Dundrum athlete broke her own Irish U20 record this morning, on her way to becoming Ireland's first ever field gold medallist at these championships. With her jump of 6.56m, the 18-year-old also recorded the second longest jump ever by an Irish female, leaving her just six cm behind Waterford athlete Kelly Proper in the all-time senior standings. That record will surely fall in time, but this is all about the here and now. Ndudi went into the event in Jerusalem in great form, having won the Irish senior championships in Santry last month. But the competition was stiffer here, and Ndudi rose to the occasion. The margins were extremely fine with Bulgaria's Plamena Mitkova hitting 6.54m while Laura Raquel Muller of Germany recorded 6.51, but nobody could top Ndudi's third jump of the day, which you can watch below. https://twitter.com/irishathletics/status/1689546395785523200 Having finished in seventh place last year, Ndudi said in her interview afterwards that this was a case of 'redemption.' "I was so hungry to win. Since I qualified for the Championships my goal was 'I want to win this, I've been repeating that to myself every day that I will be U20 Long Jump Champion," she said. Ndudi lives and trains in in France, having moved there when she was 11, but having been born and raised in Sandyford in Dublin, she said in a brilliant interview with the Irish Examiner last week that Ireland is her country, and that she's very close to her 'Irish ties.'

“It is my country,” she says. “I always said when I was younger that if I made it to the Olympics, I’d represent Ireland because we don’t often see big Irish athletes in athletics at the Olympics.

"I wanted to be one of those. I’m very close to my Irish ties.”

https://twitter.com/irishathletics/status/1689550150853607424 https://twitter.com/SportsJOEdotie/status/1689556023655141376 Meanwhile, Tyrone athlete Nick Griggs finished in second place in the men's 3000m at the same championships. Griggs, who won the event two years ago as just a 16-year-old, came into the race as the fastest athlete in the field so the slow pace may not have suited him, and he was out-kicked for gold by Swede Jonathan Grahn down the home stretch.