Tipperary homecoming for Olympic hero was an event that will live long in the memory

The homecoming for the Oympic heroes was a magnificent occasion that will live long in the memory of everyone who was there. Kickham Plaza was packed with young and old, sports people from every genre, all anxious to pay homage to Daire Lynch and Philip Doyle.

Clonmel Rowing Club provided a guard of honour to the Olympians as Tom Fennessy regaled the crowd with the significance of the fantastic achievement.
One fact that came to light was the close connection to Clonmel that Philip Doyle has.

It turns out that Philip’s great grandfather was Bill Hyland from Clonmel.
Bill was a top class athlete and cyclist in Tipperary in the 1930s and 1940s.
He won three All-Ireland titles in the hammer and a further 12 titles for the hammer in the army championships. Bill also served as a member of the USP for 17 years (USP United Sports Panel).

In one of those strange coincides where you know that the outcome is preordained, Philip Doyle does some road cycling with Banbridge Cycling Club and some of his fellow cyclists have come down to Clonmel to race in the Bill Hyland Memorial Classic when this race was an annual event until 2018. You couldn’t make it up.
After some speeches from the President of CRC, Dermot Dougan and vice-captain Pat Kinsella, our two Olympians went down among the crowd to sign autographs and pose for photographs.

Daire and Philip remained at the Plaza for two hours ensuring that everyone who wanted a picture was taken care of.
Perhaps some of the young people having selfies taken with Daire and Philip will themselves be heading off to the Olympics.
Our own Donnacha Keeley of CRC and UG is over in St Catharine’s, Canada to take part in the World U23 championships where he is rowing in the lightweight 2x with Ciaran Purdy of QUB.
They got their campaign off to a flying start on Sunday where they faced Italy, Germany and Canada in the opening round.
At 1700m, Italy who were pre-race favourites couldn’t maintain the high tempo of 41SPM (strokes per minute) and were beginning to fade as the lactic took its toll.

Having already come through the Canadians and Germany, the Irish boat made a decisive move to punish the Italians.
Posting a time just two seconds shy of the world record, this young crew of Keeley and Purdy have put down a marker that they mean business at these World Championships.
By gosh, I think Ireland is getting kind of good at this rowing lark!