Noel Carroll was three time European indoor 800 metre champion and two-time Olympic participant over the distance. He broke the Irish record on a number of occasions and set a world relay record indoors with Villanova University. He is chief executive of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce as well as coach to the UCD scholarship athletes.
Athletics has been a part of UCD since its origins in 1851 and the current club has been one of the largest since the Belfield campus opened in 1960. The tartan track, which was laid in 1978, was the first of its kind in Ireland.
Membership: Between the men's and women's teams, that numbers about 80. It's just the start of the academic year so interest and enthusiasm is always high.
Status: The club caters for all different levels of commitment in all events. My own work is with the scholarship athletes, currently consisting of David Matthews, James Nolan and Andrew Walker as well as Owen Cummins and Ann-Marie Larkin who both started this year. We do focus on the top end of the sport and the seven-day training is geared towards that.
Honours: There have been numerous achievements by the scholarship group since they first started in 1991. David Matthews has made an Olympic semi-final and holds the Irish 800m record and Antoine Burke was silver medallist in the high jump at the World Juniors. Andrew Walker ran 3:42 for 1500m this year, so the results have been consistent.
Finest hour: Having both Matthews and James Nolan in the six-man European indoor final in February was fantastic and they both ended up ranked in the top 15 indoors in the world this year. Nolan was fourth there and also had a wonderful summer except for a disappointing run in Budapest.
Worst moment: Having any athlete injured is a such a blow because we only have a handful of elite athletes and if one is out of action there is little slack in reserve. We also operate under such small resources in both training and competition yet have produced worldclass performances, so it's a pity there isn't more investment and back-up in the scholarship programmes around the country.
Club hero: Dr Tony O'Neill, as director of sport, is probably our number one fan but there are so many other coaches and motivators in the group such as Fr Kieran McDermott and current president Eric Brady. The important thing is that everybody has worked together to create such good spirits at all levels.
Greatest rivals: University sport in Ireland does not have the big-time competitive nature of, say, America as many students will also retain loyalty to other clubs or parishes around the country. Other students of course won't take the sport so seriously but the athletic club is affiliated with BLE, so the traditional clubs there will always be rivals.
