First Irish world gold for 18 years.

The last time Ireland won a medal in the World Athletics Championships it was a silver in 2009, before that it was another silver in 2003. Both those came in the women's 20km walk to Olive Loughnane and Gillian O'Sullivan respectively. The last time Ireland won a gold it was in 1995 by Sonia O'Sullivan in the women's 5000m, who had won silver in the 1500m two years earlier. The last time an Irish man won a medal of any description was in the first World Athletics Championships back in 1983, when Eamon Coghlan took gold in the 5000m.

That was until this morning.

This morning Ireland earned their third World Athletics gold medal, their third medal in the walking events and only the second medal (both gold) by any male athlete. Today in Moscow Rob Heffernan made a little bit of Irish history.

Heffernan, from Cork, had been fourth in the Olympics last year in the 50km walk and at the start today as three men pulled away it looked like he could best hope for the same today. The three had been Mikhail Ryzhov and Ivan Noskov both of Russia and Jared Tallent of Australia. At 15km those three were 12 seconds ahead, but 10km later Rob Heffernan was with them. Then 10km further on with just 15km remaining the Irish man had assumed the lead ahead of the two Russians and Poland's Gregorz Sudal. Tennent was still hanging just behind.With about 10km remaining Heffernan had the sole lead, from Ryzhov, Tallent over took Noskov and Sudal and the order at the line was Heffernan, 62 seconds ahead of Ryzhov five seconds ahead of Tallent.

The Irishman's winning time of 3 hours, 37 minutes and 56 seconds is the fastest in the world this year by more than three minutes on the previous best. But two seconds slower than his Irish national record which he set in London last August.

Cave wins Women's World Ironman

In Hawaii this year the women had for the first time their own start in the World Ironman Triathlon championships, that is a 2.4 mile (3.86km) swim, 112 mile (180.25km) cycle and full 26 mile 385 yard (42.2km) marathon to end. Unlike in the Olympic distance drafting is not allowed.

So overnight the results came through in the women's race three triathletes Amanda Stevens (USA) 55:09, Meredith Kessler (USA) 55:56 and Gina Crawford (NZL) 55:59 emerged first from the water. But hot on their heels were GBs Leanda Cave 56:03 and Mary Beth Ellis (USA) 56:06 with 2010 World Champion Caroline Steffen (SWI) 90 seconds further back.

On the cycle though Steffen caught Cave and Ellis who had dropped Stevens who had kept with them for a while. But then the Swiss racer got carded for drafting and had to serve a 4 minute penalty. But she caught the other two once more only for Cave to suffer at the hands of the officials getting a card herself,but couldn't catch them on the lap after serving her penalty on the way into transition 2. But Ellie herself was carded as she headed into that transition. So it was all level on the penalties by the time they exited the transition to go on the run.

Steffen ended the cycle in 5:06:49 ahead of Ellis 5:08:06. By the time Ellis had served her penalty she came out along side Cave who arrived at T2 in 5:12:06. Meanwhile behind them a penalty free Mirinda Carfae (AUS) came in in 5:14:19. On the run Carfae was going fast closing on Steffen and caught Cave and Ellis. She managed to drop Ellis but was not able to get past the Brit but her chase actually spurred Cave on. She started to pull away from Carfae and close on Steffen herself.

With just three miles to go Cave finally took the lead of the race then pulled away from the Swiss competitor. She ran a 3:03:13 marathon to end as World Triathlon champion in 9:15:54 ahead of Steffen 9:16:58 and Carfae 9:21:41.

So in a year of great British sporting achievements we have another women winning a world title. She may not even get a mention in BBC's Sports Personality of the Year, despite such an impressive performance.

British Bronze in World Wrestling Championships

The one woman team that ended up representing Team GB on the Olympic wrestling mat has put the disappointment of her first round defeat at home behind her in the World Championships in Edmonton, Canada.

Olga Butkevych, who gained her British Citizenship earlier this year, defeated Kyoko Shimada of Japan 5-2 in the bronze medal bout to become the first British woman to secure a medal in the World Championships. The Ukrainian born wrestler had been brought in as a sparring partner to the GB programme in 2007 but ended up becoming the contender in the 59kg category lifting European bronze last year.

To manage to get the same gold at the Worlds is some achievement especially as she was in the tougher half of the draw. She is the only shining light of a programme that failed in its Olympic target (even though she was the only hope of acquiring the top eight finish required).

The Head Coach Nikolai Kornieiev who saw a couple of his athletes fail drug tests in the run up to the Games is leaving the programme. But hopefully this bronze from Butkevych may produce some legacy going forward and see some home grown talent aim to reach her level ahead of Rio 2016.