The 22-year-old medical student at UCD sprinted around the bend and down the home straight to win her first national senior title, defeating the champion Emily Maher by a couple of strides in 23.33 seconds, a lifetime best for the winner.

"I just cannot believe it" said a delighted Cuddihy soon after crossing the line.

"Everytime I step on track recently I seem to set a personal best. I will soon wake up from this dream, " added Cuddihy who won silver in the 400m at the European junior championships three years ago.

The men's 200m title was won for the fifth time by Paul Brizzel of Ballymena & Antrim when he had far too much strength for Darragh Graham of Sli Cualann to win in 21.33 seconds.

A real battle was in prospect between Brizzel and Gary Ryan but the Nenagh athlete pulled up injured just after the halfway point and his place on the Irish team for the European championships must now be in doubt.

One athlete who had mixed feelings about winning his first national title was Vinny Mulvey, the big-hearted distance runner from Raheny Shamrocks. Mulvey took the 10,000m title in a time os 29:59.35.

However, he had high hopes of breaking the 28:50 standard that would get him to the European Championships. "It's never easy to get out there and get a standard on your own. Especially as it was much warmer out there than I expected, " said Mulvey who will now target the London marathon as his next goal.

Eugene O'Neill of Crusaders won his sixth successive 3,000m Steeplechase title with a strong run over the last lap with Mark Kirwan of Raheny in second place.

Ann Loughnane continued a family tradition when the 20-year-old from Galway took the women's 5,000m walk in the most comprehensive manner possible, lapping her two opponents, to win in 22:

22.24 seconds. In doing so Ann replaced her older sister, Olive, as champion.

Eileen O'Keeffe, the powerful Kilkenny athlete, has dominated Irish women's hammer throwing for the past number of years and it continued yesterday when she collected her sixth successive gold medal, winning with a best of 67.18 metres.