Ireland's two ILCA representatives at the Paris 2024 Olympics reviewed their performances in front of their peers at a question-and-answer session at the ILCA National Championships last weekend (August 25th). ILCA Chairman Sean Craig posed the questions at the National Yacht Club after an Olympic regatta where weather conditions were marginal and where race officials weighed the pressure to complete the daily Olympic schedule against the desired minimum wind speed.
Eve McMahon's Impressive Olympic Debut
Women’s Dinghy (ILCA 6) rep Eve McMahon (HYC) (20) told the Dun Laoghaire gathering how Rio silver medalist Annalise Murphy greatly motivated her. During the regatta, she said she dug deep and reset after a bad couple of races, where, for example, her brother pointed out she was tacking too much!
McMahon also talked about the 'amazing' Paris winner Marit Bouwmeester and how, by winning gold, the Dutch sailor became the most successful female Olympic sailor ever.
McMahon can be proud of her first Olympic regatta appearance (13th). She scored three top tens in the nine races sailed, led one of the races for a while, and will learn from her time in the most elite of fleets. Time is very much on her side - the three medallists were 16, 13 and eight years older than her and were repeat Olympians with many medals between them. Eve could attend four more Olympics before she is the same age as the gold medallist now.
Finn Lynch's Olympics: From "Intervention" to Medal Race
Finn Lynch (NYC) openly discussed an “intervention” with coaches and the team when he was lying 25th, which he said helped trigger a mindset switch that catapulted him to the Medal Race, together with slightly better conditions and slightly better starting.
Lynch, who has also declared for LA 2028, will, no doubt, examine his start and first-leg performances. In six of the nine races, he made up ground on the fleet after the first windward leg, which is perhaps evidence of speed and strategic smarts once he settled into racing. Now 28, he will be just slightly above the average age of the medal race participants when Los Angeles comes around. His overall 10th position was one better than that of Mark Lyttle in Atlanta in 1996, which was previously the best Irish male singlehanded Olympic sailing result.
Lynch, who has been campaigning solidly for ten years, will take a break until the new year.