Thomas Barr progresses to 400H final at World University Games
Last updated on .From the section Athletics
Thomas Barr has progressed to the men's 400m hurdles final at the World University Games as the fastest qualifier while Ciara Everard has also made the women's 800m final.
Waterford man Barr clocked 49.75 in his semi-final in South Korea on Thursday after a 49.96 heat win on Wednesday.
Barr improved his Irish record to 48.65 in Rome last month.
Kilkenny athlete Everard progressed to the final of her event as a fastest loser after a 2:02.10 clocking.
That left the UCD student fifth in her semi-final in Gwangju behind winner New Zealand's Angela Petty.
Both Irish athletes will take part in their finals on Friday morning.
Northern Ireland Commonwealth Games team member from last year, Dempsey McGuigan, missed out on a place in the men's hammer final after finishing 16th in qualification in 65.09m.
Irish sprinters Cliodhna Manning and Phil Healy narrowly failed to qualify for Friday's women's 100m final.
Kilkenny athlete Manning clocked 11.79 to finish third in her heat with Cork woman Healy fourth in her qualifier in 11.81.
A time of 11.77 would have been good enough to progress to the decider.
Meanwhile, Letterkenny man Mark English will begin his challenge for European Under-23 gold in Tallinn on Friday.
Despite an indifferent summer season so far, English probably remains gold medal favourite in the 800m after winning European Championship outdoor bronze and European Indoor silver over the last 12 months.
English could only finish third in his latest outing at Cork City Sports on Tuesday as he faded badly to clock 1:47.89 to finish behind American Michael Rutt and Denmark's Andreas Bube.
UCD student English will be joined in the 800m by Karl Griffin.
