IRELAND’S PERFORMANCE AT the European Championships will be a “litmus test” ahead of the next Olympics, athletics high performance director Kevin Ankrom said.

Reigning world champion Rob Heffernan and two-time European cross-country champion Fionnuala Britton head up the 30-strong Irish team for Zurich next month.

The squad also includes plenty of young talent with 21-year-olds Thomas Barr and Mark English and 20-year-old Sarah Lavin all eyeing strong track showings.

That trio are expected to be among Ireland’s leading lights for the 2016 Olympics in Rio.

Ankrom said: “This is a litmus test of where we’re at coming into an Olympic Games cycle and it’s perfect timing.

I think the ones who are successful now at the Championships and moving forward, those are the ones we’re going to see come 2016.

For the first time since the 1998 Europeans in Budapest, Ireland have named a squad that does not include Paul Hession, David Gillick or Derval O’Rourke.

All three called time on their athletics careers this summer and Ankrom is reluctant to put too much pressure on Ireland’s next generation too soon.

When you have a group like we have coming in that haven’t gone through that process year after year after year like the seasoned Dervals and Gillicks and Hessions, I have to be confident that these guys can do it but at the same time we have to also manage the expectation and just get through each round and take it step by step.

“At the end of the day we’re going to have some excitements and some disappointments like every game goes. I just hope that we can have more excitements going forward here.”

He added: “We’re all in a good space. I’m excited about the 30 that are there, I am excited about going forward and I’m excited about the group that we have in place.

“We’ll continue to keep building on it and working our way forward.”

– Reporting by Stephen Doyle, 98FM

Heffernan and Britton lead Ireland’s team of 30 at European Championships