For the past few days, Sarah Healy has been back doing training runs near her family home in south Dublin. Some locals who recognise the European indoor champion might be mildly surprised at her near-pedestrian pace.
“It’s been pretty bad,” said Healy. “You always forget how quickly you can lose fitness. But it has to be done, giving the body a complete break from running like that for a couple of weeks.”
It’s just three weeks since Healy was in her “best shape ever”. Or at least that’s what all the indications were. In the last countdown to the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, the 24-year-old was completing track sessions at a blistering pace previously thought beyond her. Making the 1,500 metres final was the very least of her ambitions.
“To be honest, my last few races before Tokyo didn’t go well,” she said. “They weren’t bad, but they definitely weren’t my best. But then I did some sessions in the holding camp in Hong Kong, sessions I wasn’t able to do before; it still felt like I was in my best shape ever. So it’s a little frustrating the way it worked out.”
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At the start of this year, well before winning the European Indoor 3,000m title in March, Healy had gone through a metamorphosis of mindset. She promised herself not to invest too much emotion in the outcome of her races, whether things went for better or for worse. Tokyo would put all that to a litmus test.
After easing through her qualifying heat, Healy went into her semi-final knowing only the top six would progress to the final. Zero room for error. The pace was dawdling for the opening two laps and in the “messy” home-stretch sprint, she ended up seventh. Her time of 4:08.78 was her slowest all summer.
Initial disappointment at missing out by one place soon turned into a strange mix of relief-slash-excitement after it was confirmed Italy’s Marta Zenoni, who finished in sixth, was disqualified for jostling. So, Healy was through to the final, but her confidence had been dented.
She recalled the scene: “Obviously, I was very disappointed that I didn’t make the final. Then it looked like a disqualification, even though that wasn’t certain. It wasn’t long after that when I heard I was in the final.
“It had never happened to me before, so it was a whole new experience like that. It probably did impact on the mindset a little going [into] the final – I really don’t remember much about it. But I felt good, the fast pace should have suited me. But then, dropping back from sixth or seventh to finish 10th, wasn’t quite the result I wanted. I didn’t really have the legs in the end.
“That I wasn’t able to deliver the performance I thought I was capable of, or my best performance on the day, that’s the disappointment. I have been able to do that before quite a few times this season.”
It’s not that her season ran completely out of steam, yet there were some warning signs that things were starting to plateau before Tokyo. Healy was unable to reproduce the finishing spark that had seen her run three lifetime bests in her five opening Diamond League races, including a rare 1,500m victory in Rome.
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The Tokyo final was her 23rd race this season, including eight indoor races where she also finished sixth in the 3,000m at the World Indoors in Nanjing, China.
“I feel like maybe my ambitions did change over the season and I did step up to a level where I wasn’t at before, and got to compete across lots of Diamond League races,“ she said. ”So, obviously there are lots of positives.
“And what I get to do, it’s such an amazing opportunity – sometimes you have to remind yourself of that. And I still do love it, enjoy the training, and that’s the most important thing. This year I think I’ve enjoyed it more than ever.”
Healy witnessed two breakthrough Irish performances in Tokyo – Kate O’Connor’s silver medal in the heptathlon and Cian McPhillips finishing fourth in the 800m. McPhillips’ Irish record of 1:42.15 was just 0.8 of a second off bronze.
Like O’Connor, Healy had shown her potential by winning silver at the European Under-20 Championships in Sweden in 2019.
On Sunday, Healy hosted a running clinic as a Davy ambassador. Davy is supporting the next generation of Irish athletes.
After that complete break from running – which, post-Tokyo, saw her enjoy a family holiday in Okinawa, Japan – Healy will return to her training base near Manchester later this week. There, she will work with the husband-and-wife coaching team of Trevor Painter and Jenny Meadows.
The training group didn’t come away from Tokyo empty-handed: Georgia Hunter Bell edged out Keely Hodgkinson to win silver and bronze respectively for Britain in the 800m, after Kenya’s Lilian Odira came through to strike a surprise gold.
“We probably are going to change a few things in my training,” she added. “But it won’t be anything major. Everyone in the group is very supportive of each other and that’s a really good environment to be in.
“I’m looking forward to some indoor races again, definitely over 3,000m. It will also be the first time in five years when there’s no Olympics or World Championships – in 2026 – so that obviously puts a lot more focus on the European Championships (in Birmingham in August).”
