Irish Amateur Swimming Association the national championship held in 1990 at the Guinness Pool. By the turn of the millennium Ireland still did not have an Olympic-sized pool placing any swimmer training here at an enormous disadvantage at international competition. At the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta Michelle Smith became Ireland's first Olympic medalist in swimming - winning three golds and a bronze. A shadow was cast over these medals when subsequently in 1998 she was banned for 4 years from the sport for tampering with a urine sample using alcohol, during a mandatory out of competition test. In the late 1990s various abuse
1999 Champion Hurdle 1999 Champion Hurdle The 1999 Champion Hurdle was a horse race held at Cheltenham Racecourse on Tuesday 16 March 1999. It was the 70th running of the Champion Hurdle. The winner for the second consecutive year was J. P. McManus's Istabraq, a seven-year-old gelding trained in Ireland by Aidan O'Brien and ridden by Charlie Swan. Istabraq started the 4/9 favourite and won by three and a half lengths from his stable companion Theatreworld, who had also finished runner-up in the previous two years, with the leading British hurdler French Holly in third place. Twelve of the fourteen runners completed the