Protection from a piece of ash destroying your ankles, yes please
Anyone who has ever played hurling at any level is bound to have felt the full force of a cáman into the side of the ankle at some stage. The pain after a piece of three-and-a-half-foot of ash smashes into the ligaments and bones from either a throw-in, or else just a general ruck is pretty excruciating.  The pain is one thing, but it’s the days of hobbling around and telling everyone ‘I’m grand,you should see the other lad’ is probably worse.
Well a camogie player in Offaly may have the answer to all our Junior B problems with her invention – An Tionchar The Impact Boot. The GAA specific invention, is the idea of Shiofra Ryan, who’s a transition year student in St. Brendan’s Community School in Birr Co. Offaly.
She has designed a new type of hurling/camogie boot designed to protect the ankle while also giving some much needed support to the foot as a whole. She looked at the movements of both Richie Hogan of Kilkenny and Steven Gerrard for her inspiration. ShÃofra discovered that the Kilkenny man did three time as many jumps and straight line runs as the Liverpool captain and decided that GAA players needed a piece of footwear different to the bog standard ‘soccer boot’.
She then designed a prototype with cushioned ankle support  as well as insole that works as a shock absorber and the boot also has an inbuilt arch support for those flat footed hurlers out there.
The project received a second place prize in her category  at the  BT Young Scientist and she is now going ahead to a  Business Bootcamp in UCD in March, where she’s ll get to show the boot to some of the country’s top business people.
We think its a brilliant idea and have to say that maybe we should offer some to our opponent the next time we’re standing over them, having taken a chunk out of their ankle with our blood stained hurl in our hands.
H/T to Sportswomen.ie
