BY KIERAN McCARTHY
NICOLA Tuthill warmed up for the West Cork Sports Star monthly award presentation on Friday night by fitting in a gym session that morning followed by a throwing session later in the day.
That commitment to training is one of the reasons why the Kilbrittain teenager (19) enjoyed her best year yet.
Award winner Nicola Tuthill with her parents, Norman and Colette.
‘The highlights for me were either the European Team Games where I broke the national U23 record or the European U23s where I placed fourth in my first year at U23 level,’ Nicola says.
Add to that, she continually broke her personal best which now stands at 67.85m – a gigantic jump of nearly six metres compared to her 2022 PB – while the West Cork teen was also crowned Irish women’s senior hammer champion, again.
It’s been a year of notable gains for Nicola, not least her PB at the European Games in the summer; that was her first senior international championships and she looked at home on the big stage.
Her best throw heading into the games was 66.57, but in Krakow she threw over that four times, including her best effort of 67.85. Nicola now sits second on the Irish senior all-time list behind, with national record holder Eileen O’Keeffe (73:21) the only woman ahead of her.
‘It looks like a massive jump on paper,’ Nicola says, before pointing to the elbow injury that sidelined her for a huge chunk of 2022.
‘While I did break my elbow last year I was still doing a lot of training, a lot of drills and a lot of gym work, so I had been training at a slightly further distance than I had been competing at before I broke my elbow. It was a case of building back up to where I had been because I didn’t have the chance to show the work that I had done in the winter of 2022 before the injury.
‘This year I got a massive block of training in, added to the training the year before, and it all showed.’
Just as encouraging was Nicola’s performance at the European U23 Championships in Espoo, Finland in July – she finished fourth, just outside the medals, but this is also her first year at U23 level. She will be eligible again when the 2025 Europeans U23s roll around, and the three athletes who finished ahead of her will all be over age.
The signs, and her rising trajectory, all suggest Nicola is on the right track, and picking up a West Cork Sports Star monthly award for July is deserved recognition of her feats this year. She was joined by her parents, Norman and Collette, who play important roles in Nicola’s success. Her dad built the home throwing cage on the family farm in Baurleigh; their own centre of excellence in Kilbrittain. Her mom is by her side on every throwing session at home, and last Friday had the wellies on to walk the field and collect the hammers that zipped through the sky. And it all adds up, playing its part in Nicola’s rise to the top of the women’s hammer throw in Ireland.
She won’t turn 20 until December, but has already won nine national titles at various age-groups, and now has a West Cork Sports Star senior monthly award to add to her 2020 overall youth award.
The Celtic Ross West Cork Sports Star Awards are a joint awards run by the Celtic Ross Hotel, The Southern Star and C103
