Athletics National Indoor Championships: Ian O'Riordanreports on the quest to eventually have a national indoor arena built

It's something of a shame that this weekend's National Indoor Athletics championships take place without our reigning world champion Derval O'Rourke, who this year is concentrating solely on the outdoor season. Still that won't prevent plenty of high quality competition ahead of next month's European Indoors in Birmingham, where Ireland will still have two defending champions, David Gillick in the 400 metres and Alistair Cragg the 3,000 metres.

The real shame is the event still hasn't got a proper home, despite two decades of promises from the Government.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s the only indoor facility available in the country was that belonging to Nenagh Athletic Club, which, in fairness, served its purpose, but also its time - and was never designed to become a national indoor arena, which through Government default, it did.

Nenagh can't be criticised for providing the facility, but it soon became very seriously and obviously out-dated. It was some relief then to the Athletics Association of Ireland (AAI) when, through the Northern Ireland Athletics Federation, the Odyssey Arena in Belfast was made available to stage the championships in 2003, with a temporary track installed in what essentially is a multi-purpose entertainment venue.

It's been home to the championships ever since (with the exception of 2005, when a Westlife concert took precedence) and once again the country's best athletes will make the trip north tomorrow and Sunday - thankful for the Odyssey but no doubt wondering why Ireland still hasn't got a proper indoor arena of its own.

They may be interested in a story from 1987, when a certain athletics journalist sat in the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham, to hear then taoiseach Charles Haughey unveil grand plans for the long-awaited National Indoor Arena, which after a feasibility study costing over £1 million was ear-marked for the Dublin docklands. Overcome with a sense of déjà vu, the journalist questioned whether he'd see this arena in his lifetime, to which Haughey cynically replied, "How old are you?" and then laughed.

Thankfully that journalist is still alive, although needless to say he's not getting any younger.

Some 12 years later another athletics journalist (no relation) stood in Santry to hear Jim McDaid, then Minister for Tourism, Sport and Recreation, unveil grand plans for a similar indoor arena, to be built adjacent to the athletics stadium.

In his speech on the 1999 Budget, McDaid said the indoor arena "signalled its (the Government) commitment to the development of sport and recreational facilities".

Such an indoor facility, he stated, was "prioritised in the recently published review of the Government's Action Programme for the Millennium."

And in his end of year statement for 2000, which McDaid had entitled a Remarkable Year In Implementation Of Sport Policy, his went through the £36 million allocated under the Sport Capital Programme and highlighted the "£4.8 million towards the provision of a national indoor athletic training facility at Morton Stadium, Santry, to complement the existing outdoor athletics stadium."

What in fact happened typifies the mess surrounding Ireland's quest for an indoor running track: Fingal County Council agreed to make a site available free of charge, commissioned a feasibility study, the results of which were subsequently examined and accepted by the Department and the Irish Sports Council. In July 2000, the capital grant of £4.8 million was announced towards the overall cost of the proposed facility. However, the Department never agreed a payment schedule of funding or ever gave sanction to accept tenders - and no work on the facility was ever undertaken.

All this comes against the backdrop of Ireland's incredible indoor running tradition. It started with Ronnie Delany blazing his great trail on the US indoor circuit, and probably peaked with Eamonn Coghlan, arguably the greatest indoor runner of all time. It's a tradition that includes multiple World Indoor champions Marcus O'Sullivan (1,500 metres champion in 1987, 1989 and 1993) and Frank O'Mara (3,000 metres champion in 1987 and 1991) and more recently a series of European Indoor medallists including Mark Carroll (3,000 metres), James Nolan (1,500 metres) and Karen Shinkins (400 metres). So to the latest chapter of this shameful saga: clearly the people most desperate to get an indoor running track are the AAI, and chief executive Brendan Hackett admits it is now their number one priority: "We're in the process of completing our new strategy document, and will be presented to the Government within the coming weeks.

"In that strategy we have identified clear objectives, one of which is the building of indoor tracks. We actually feel there should be two indoor tracks in Dublin for the size of the population, and in the years ahead one or two regional tracks, certainly one in each province."

Hackett makes the comparison with Sweden, which in 1987 - the same year as Haughey's false promise - had no indoor tracks, and now has 20. The much-hyped Abbotstown development will include a large indoor hall covering multi-sports, but there are no definite plans yet for an indoor running track.

The AAI will argue where they believe that track should be: "In the past the presentations may have been too big a venture, and there wasn't sufficient funding for that. We have made that argument this time, and identified a site that will be both used and reasonably viable.

"There is an amount of money set aside, so the ball is really in our court. I would hope these plans can be underway by the end of 2007. It's very much top of our agenda for 2007, and we're hoping a decision can be made this year so that the project can get underway as quickly as possible. One of the biggest arguments for this is the success we've had in indoor athletics. But an indoor arena is also a fantastic place to go and watch athletics, as well as training in it."

Belfast this weekend will definitely be a reminder of that - how indoor athletics still makes for great entertainment - but also how 20 years on the National Indoor Championships are regrettably still a moveable feast.