Ellen Walshe creates history by breaking one-minute barrier
Ellen Walshe became the first Irish woman to break the one-minute barrier in the 100m butterfly.
The 18-year-old last night smashed the Irish record of 1:00.21 when coming home in 59.54 for gold at the Flanders Swim Cup in Belgium.
Walshe took almost a second off her own personal best of 1:00.44 from the 2019 Irish Open Swimming Championships to remove Shauna O’Brien’s 2015 time from the record books.
It was a promising start to the year for the Templeogue swimmer who also secured a gold medal in the 200m Butterfly last night in a time of 2:14.15.
Walshe is part of a team of nine Irish swimmers at the Flanders Swim Cup where Shane Ryan, Darragh Greene, Conor Ferguson, Danielle Hill, and Niamh Coyne have all made the winners podium.
On Saturday evening, Limerick’s Eoin Corby broke the first Irish junior swimming record of the year in the 50m Breaststroke when he clocked 28.33 in the final at the Geneva Challenge in Switzerland, where a squad of 15 Irish junior swimmers are competing.
The focus for Irish competitors now shifts to the Irish Open Swimming Championships at the National Aquatic Centre in April, which will serve as Olympic and Paralympic trials and as a qualifier for the European senior and junior championships.
