Olympics remain “the” event

IN ALL FAIRNESS

In the modern world of sport, there was a feeling that the Olympic Games was losing its place as the greatest sporting event on the planet. Thankfully, the first ten days or so of competition in Paris have reaffirmed its standing as the best of them all.

Football or soccer, depending on what you like to call it, takes so much of the sporting spotlight nowadays, it can be easy to forget how great other sports are, particularly when one competes for their country.

You only have to look at how Scottie Scheffler reacted so emotionally during the playing of the US national anthem after winning gold in the men’s golf on Sunday. Coming into the event which the current world number one was playing in for the first time, there is no way he would have understood the emotions.

Bar the Ryder Cup every two years, golf is an individual sport where they play for themselves and for money. With the world team golf competition done away with a few years ago, bar the Olympics there is no other competition where golfers compete for something other than themselves, and how Scheffler reacted should make Olympic Golf something all the leading players in the world will aim to qualify for, particularly as it will be only on every four years, rather than the annual chase for one of the elusive four majors.

Shane Lowry and Rory McIlroy were two realistic medal hopes for Ireland if they produced their best, with the latter giving it a right good go. At the turn on Sunday, it looked a forlorn hope as he was six back of the medals before Rory produced one of the runs that we know he can to propel himself into gold medal contention.

However, as he said himself, he tends to get hit more than most over the last few years, as his second shot into the fifteenth hole found the water and with it went his medal hopes. Some wondred why did McIlroy take such a risk and not go to the middle of the green like his playing partners. However, this is where the week-in week-out mindset of a golfer comes in as at this point of the round, McIlroy was going for gold, he doesn’t play for second and third place on the tour. His costly chip shot was about two feet away from pitching perfectly and giving him a chance of a sixth straight birdie and really challenging for gold which ultimately went to Scheffler who book-ended a superb year with a closing 61, more or less steamrolling every one when he got in the groove, as he has done for most of the season.

For Ireland, it has been a superb Olympics so far with a record seven medals won. It has already been an historic week for Tipperary with Clonmel rower Daire Lynch becoming the first Olympic medallist from the Premier County since Nenagh’s own Bob Tisdall won gold in the 400m Hurdles at the 1932 Games in Los Angeles, with the next summer games returning to the West coast of the United States in four years’ time.

Teaming up with Belfast’s Philip Doyle, they added to Ireland’s golden era in rowing with a bronze in the heavyweight double-sculls, an event they’ll be under pressure to compete in LA as with the lightweight sculls grade being removed from the schedule where Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy became Olympic greats by winning a second gold medal, it’ll be some battle to just make the Irish boat itself.

It’s to the great credit of coach Seamus Casey and all those in Irish rowing, particularly down Skibbereen way for turning this country into such a force on the water and hopefully this is just the start as the sport comes increasingly into the mainstream and one in which, with the right financial backing, is one Ireland can target medals in at every Games going forward.

Tipperary’s focus on Paris isn’t over as Sharlene Mawdsley goes again on Friday morning in the semi-finals of the 4x400m relay. Having run three races so far in the mixed relay and individual 400m, she has seen the rise in standard from the European Championships, but that will only benefit her in the long term.

In the short term, it is about getting as fresh as possible for Friday as most of the focus will be on her to try and get the Ireland team into the final, likely without Rhasidat Adeleke, who bar a surprise, will be in the 400m final on Friday night. If Sharlene and her teammates can somehow qualify for the final, and get Adeleke back, Saturday night could be very special indeed for the European champions in the discipline.