Maeve Kyle - a key figure in athletics passes away at 96.

Maeve Kyle, the Kilkenny woman who made Ballymena her home has died at the age of 96.

She became Ireland's first female track and field Olympian at the 1956 summer Games in Melbourne.

Mrs. Kyle had played hockey for Ireland before she forged a successful international athletics career after meeting Ballymena man Sean Kyle in 1953.

She ran in the 100m and 200m at the Melbourne Games after having to pay the then huge sum of £200 which the Olympic Council of Ireland had demanded of her.

Kyle went on to compete at further Olympic Games in Rome and Tokyo before winning a 400m bronze medal at the 1966 European Indoor Championships in Dortmund.

She moved into coaching alongside her husband at the Ballymena & Antrim club which they had set up in 1955.

International athletes who benefited from the couple's guidance included high jump stars Sharon McPeake and Janet Boyle in addition to Mark Forsythe, Mark Kirk, Sean O'Neill, Eddie King and countless others down through the decades.

Mary Peters, who went on to achieve Olympic glory in 1972, had a stint at the Ballymena & Antrim club early in her career while both Kyles were continued to coach international athletes well into their 70s after the emergence of the likes of James McIlroy, Paul Brizzel, John McAdorey and Anna Boyle.

During the worst period of the Northern Ireland troubles in the early 1970s, the Kyles were instrumental in keeping athletics on the local sporting agenda.

She acted as manager for both Great Britain and Ireland teams and as a 71-year-old coached the Irish relay squads at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney.

She was appointed an OBE in the 2008 New Year Honours list and also served as President of the then Northern Ireland Athletics Federation during the mid-1990s.

2008 also saw her being inducted into the RTE/Irish Sports Council's Hall of Fame as Ballymena & Antrim was named the UK's athletics club of the year while she was the recipient of the Belfast Telegraph/Sport Northern Ireland's Hall of Fame honour in 2009.

Maeve Kyle was predeceased by her husband Sean in November 2015 and is survived by daughter Shauna.