O’Donovan And McCarthy Retain Their Gold: Olympics 2024

Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy retained their gold title in the Olympics in men’s final lightweight double sculls.

At Paris 2024, the duo was able to finish the race within 6:10.99 for back-to-back gold titles. They started off at lane three and were seen in third place in the beginning. Initially, the leads were taken by Greece and Italy at the first 400m. They both struggled at that moment.

(Also read: Tom Fannon Creates Fresh Irish Record For 50m Freestyle Semis: Updates From Paris 2024)

The Corkonian duo was speeding up when 1300m were left. They were in a position to overtake Italy and close the round within 1.2 seconds ahead of the Greece pair.

It was remarkable to see O’Donovan and McCarthy accelerate after halfway was gone. They started taking the lead with 40 strokes per minute. It was then that they took charge by merely 0.98 seconds and took victory for their own selves.

O’Donovan and McCarthy became the first Irish contestants to win gold medals at successive games after Pat O’Callaghan. That was in the 1928 and 1932 Olympics in men’s hammer throw.

It was a special moment for O’Donovan since he managed to secure the third title in the Olympics, in a row. Before this, he was with his brother Gary in Rio in 2016 whereas the gold was delayed at the Tokyo Games 2020, also with McCarthy.

O’Donovan and McCarthy sentiments after winning gold

McCarthy said it was “always the aim” to win a gold medal at the Olympics and he worked hard for it each time. O’Donovan confessed that the historic victory was just “a fluke to be honest”. He was being straightforward when he said, “That’s definitely going down as a fluke in my eyes, that’s about it”.

Among the chants of ‘ole ole ole’ from their supporters in the audience, O’Donovan and McCarthy won their strategic race with a confident and dominant performance. Before the medal ceremony, O’Donovan said, “Oh it was always in doubt for everyone else, no one believed we could do it coming into this competition and against all the odds we stuck with it”.

He explained they had trained hard and were privileged to take their country on top of the heat with the number of seeds the Irish contestants had been putting in with their medals. They were able to prove their doubters wrong, therefore he was pleased with his performance. Ultimately, he declared, it was a fantastic day for Ireland.

McCarthy couldn’t hold his thrill of winning gold as he was happy to be performing in front of his friends and family. The people cheering for him from the crowd were amazing, he admitted. It was a crazy journey for him and found it to be an honour to be rowing beside his partner.

McCarthy, 27, is the fifth individual to join the group of Irish athletes who have medalled in the Olympics. It is an excitement for Ireland people to see another category winning medal at the Olympics by the boxer Kellie Harrington. She won a bronze medal in the 60 kg category in just a week.

With this, Ireland is making a record of winning medals at the Olympics for the first time in abundance. Harrington Philip Doyle, Daire Lynch and Daniel Wiffen from Ireland have won five medals, leading to 13th position on the complete table of Olympics 2024.

Ireland won five medals in London 2012 which included one gold medal, won by Katie Taylor. This could be considered the most glorious year for Ireland with the number of medals still increasing every day.

On the other hand, finishing second in women’s final B, Aifric Keogh and Fiona Murtagh finished in second place. Also, Ross Corrigan and Nathan Timoney secured sixth place in the men’s final.