EIGHTEEN IRISH ATHLETES have been given top-level grants of €40,000 as part of the Irish Sports Council’s funding plans for 2013.
In total almost €1.7 million was allocated directly to 86 of the country’s top athletes out of an overall investment package of €33 million, announced today by the Minister of State for Transport, Tourism and Sport Michael Ring TD.
In line with the International Carding Scheme Irish athletes are classified as podium (€40,000), world class (€20,000) or international (€12,000). The 18 “podium” athletes for 2013 are as follows:
- Athletics: Robert Heffernan
- Boxing: Katie Taylor, Michael Conlan, Paddy Barnes, John Joe Nevin, Joe Ward
- Cycling: James Brown, Colin Lynch, Mark Rohan, Catherine Walsh
- Paralympics Ireland: Orla Barry, Michael McKillop, Jason Smyth, Catherine O’Neill
- Paralympic Swimming Ireland: Darragh McDonald, Bethany Firth
- Sailing: Peter O’Leary, Annalise Murphy
The total funding package includes €19.3 million for National Governing Bodies of sport, €5.1 million for Local Sports Partnerships and €8.6 million for High Performance programmes, the Sports Council said earlier today.
In addition, €275,000 has been allocated to the IRFU to go towards their bid to qualify a women’s team for the Rugby Sevens tournament at the 2016 Olympics in Rio.
Why in gods name are the IRFU not putting forward some sort of mens 7s rugby team. Its crazy to think that we’ll have no presence in it when it returns to the olympics
I’m sure they are. Perhaps it was assumed in the article. Inconceivable that it wouldn’t happen.
I don’t think it’s listed here because this article is to do with individual athletes who require and are hence receiving grants for their contribution to the sport.
The mens rugby are a professional team, and I can assure you that their teams salaries are far higher than the combined ‘podium’ level grants listed in this article. Sure, you can see them whenever you see an O2, Guinness or National Dairy Council advert. Do you think the womens rugby or any of the other athletes listed have anywhere near the same budget or recognition?
They aren’t listed anywhere because they don’t exist, at least in anywhere near the form that they should be at for the 2016 olympics. They have shown a bit of support for the Shamrock Warriors 7s team, so maybe they are cooking something in secret. There are 3 day tornaments going on around the world right now and we have no representation, countries such as the US and canada have. Surely we could get 12 of the quickest lads from the Ulster bank league to be on an Irish mens 7s team. Wouldn’t cost that much. The US have lads like carlin Isles playing, who while extremely fast, hadn’t touched a rugby ball before 6 months ago.