Last Updated: Wednesday, 19 March 2008, 12:56 GMT
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Cash woes force McIlroy to quit
McIlroy had been expected to retire after this year’s Olympics
Larne runner James McIlroy has announced his immediate retirement from athletics, citing financial worries as the reason for his surprise decision.
In January, the 800 metre runner had indicated that he would quit the sport after this year’s Olympics in Beijing.
[b]“I just wouldn’t want to get further into debt,” McIlroy told BBC Sport.
“I wasn’t prepared to lose my house (for Beijing). I need to look for full-time employment because I wasn’t earning anything from athletics.” [/b]
McIlroy added that the recent indoor season, which included an appearance for Britain at the World Indoors in Valencia, had left him £300 out of pocket.
The 31-year-old lost his funding from UK Athletics a couple of seasons ago and McIlroy added that the lack of financial support and back-up has made his career an “uphill struggle” since then.
“The nature of the beast is quite hard. If you can’t see doctors and medical staff, it gets next to impossible,” he said.
"Ideally, it would have been nice to continue through to (the 2010 Commonwealth Games in) New Delhi but every sportsperson comes to this crossroads.
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[b]"I was getting absolutely nothing (in terms of funding) although I don’t want to go into it too much.
“The people you are up against, it’s a full-time occupation (for them) and they have a high-level network of support.” [/b]
McIlroy burst on the scene in dramatic fashion in 1998 when as a comparative running novice, he finished fourth in the 800m final at the European Championships in Budapest.
A couple of weeks earlier, he had run a Northern Ireland 800m record of 1:45.32 when placing fourth in a world-class race at the Nice Grand Prix.
The Larne man’s talent had been immediately noticed by Ballymena & Antrim coach Sean Kyle a year earlier when he turned up unannounced at the Antrim Forum.
McIlroy represented Ireland in his opening year on the international circuit but the Larne native opted to switch allegiance to Great Britain a year later when he also decided to change coaches to Kim McDonald.
The 800m runner did qualify for the 2000 Olympics in Sydney but despite reaching the semi-finals, he had lost the spark that had been on show two years earlier.
After missing the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton, McIlroy was touted as a medal prospect at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester but a poor tactical race saw him finishing a distant sixth in the final.
I progressed better than anybody else in Britain over the last 20 years
James McIlroy
McIlroy failed to make the British team for the 2004 Olympics in Athens but he managed to produce a personal best of 1:44.65 in August 2005 which was the fastest time by a Briton for more than a decade.
The Larne man went into the Commonwealth Games seven months later as one of the favourites but he failed to even make the final in Melbourne which probably represented his career low.
“I should have definitely won a medal in Manchester. I just ran it badly,” said McIlroy on Wednesday.
"In Melbourne, a lot of things happened behind the scenes that week which didn’t give me a chance.
"If everything had gone to plan, I think I would have won that Commonwealth Games but it wasn’t meant to be.
"Things (my career) started off brightly. I had a few bad years but I came back into it.
"People always say, ‘you didn’t progress’ but I think I progressed better than anybody else in Britain over the last 20 years.
“I thoroughly enjoyed my time in running but now it’s time to call it a day.”