Orla Comerford hopes to bring her career-best form to Paris next month after the 100-metre sprinter secured her spot on the Ireland team for the Paralympic Games.
The Raheny Shamrock runner is one of five athletes confirmed on Ireland’s Para athletics teams for Paris – alongside Greta Streimikyte (third Games), Mary Fitzgerald (second Games), Shauna Bocquet and Aaron Shorten (both first Games).
This will be Comerford’s third Games, she also qualified for Rio and Tokyo, but the Dubliner heads to France in the form of her life having last month smashed through the 12-second ceiling for the first time.
Running in the Irish Nationals 100-metre final at Morton Stadium, a field that included Rhasidat Adeleke and Sarah Lavin, Comerford finished in a time of 11.90 – finally breaking that 12-second barrier.
Immediately after the race, the athletes were swarmed by children, so it took what felt like a lifetime for Comerford to learn her finishing time.
“We went off the track and there was a whole bunch of kids with stuff to sign,” recalls Comerford, who has Stargardt’s disease – a degenerative condition that affects her central vision.
“And I was like, ‘What did I run? Somebody tell me.’ Eventually the girls came over and told me my time and I think I screamed.
“I think it was also a big relief for me, for so long I have chased that sort of time. But for me I want to run faster times, the 11.7s, 11.8s.
“But you can’t do those times if you don’t break the 12 initially. I feel for me it’s sort of like the opening of the gates. My coach says it’s sort of like opening a pack of Pringles, once you open them that’s it, you’re in, you are not just having one.”
The Tokyo Paralympics in 2021 were difficult for Comerford, who is a graduate of the National College of Art and Design and is currently working at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, because in the lead up to those Games her coach Brian Corcoran died. Before flying out to Japan, she visited Brian.
“That was the last time I saw him. Yeah, I miss him,” says Comerford.
She keeps in touch with Brian’s family and his wife, Connie. When Comerford raced at the Diamond League Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregen last May, she heard a voice shouting her club name from the stands.
“A friend of Connie’s, who used to run with Brian, was living out there. She called him saying, ‘You’re going to have to get tickets to the Diamond League, there’s going to be a Raheny athlete, one of Brian’s athletes is there.’
“I was running around the track and I hear someone call out, ‘Raheny’ I ran over and there he was. It was lovely for us to meet. I feel like Brian’s legacy is still, he’s in my ear all the time when I’m on the track.”
Having got on top of problematic feet and hamstring issues, Comerford is now hoping to deliver her best performance yet at a Paralympic Games.
“I definitely want to be very competitive. I don’t want to make up numbers on the team, I don’t want to just make the final. Those were great achievements when I was younger, I think having had that experience and being in the position I’m in now, I definitely want to be pushing for a podium. I want to be in the mix.”
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