Athlete Mark English has won a silver medal for Ireland in the men’s 800m at the European Indoor Athletics Championships, held in Prague.
The UCD athlete from Letterkenny, who will turn 22 next week, came up from fifth place and ended up grabbing second place, ahead of Thijmen Kupers of the Netherlands. Polish athlete Marcin Lewandowski took first place.
English’s time of 1:47.20 was five-hundredths of a second better than Kupers, who was defeated by the Irishman’s great effort on the final straight.
After the race, English said: “When you have that speed over the last 200 metres, and you’re passing top quality runners, such as Almgren of Sweden, the second-fastest man in Europe going into this – I passed him with ease – it’s such a great feeling.”