Katie George Dunlevy and Eve McCrystal have won Silver in the Women’s B3000 metre Individual Pursuit on the final day of competition at the velodrome.

Para Cycling

Katie George Dunlevy, piloted by Eve McCrystal put in an exceptional performance to win silver in the
Women’s B 3000m Individual Pursuit with a time of 3:21.315 on Sunday.

The pair are among the most successful Paralympians ever to pull on the Irish jersey and this is going to be their last games riding together.

“The emotions over the last few hours have been very different,” said McCrystal.

“When you’re so close to gold, you’re slightly disappointed you didn’t get it but we’re absolutely ecstatic with silver. It goes beyond what we knew we could do it but we’re up against three British bikes.”

“It lets a little bit of doubt creep in. Underneath it all we knew we could do it but you have to deliver it on the day. The staff that we have around us, I just want to mention them. It’s such a small team but
we’re treated so well. I just want to say thank you to every single one of them. Without them, we wouldn’t be here today with a medal around our necks.”

Talking about their preparation, she added, “It’s very hard. We’re ten years together. It took us a few years to get to the top. It’s really hard to get to the top and it’s fricking harder to stay there. You have so much pressure. I don’t think we ever felt external pressure from people but it was internal pressure that both of us felt to stay there. That’s just so hard to do as an athlete.”

“When the two of you are together you constantly don’t want to let each other down so you’re fighting every single day – that’s the fight for the last three years coming out there in a medal. We’ve always just trusted each other.”

“I didn’t want to use my broken collarbone earlier in the year as an excuse,” added Dunlevy.

“I was just focused on trying to recover from that, get training and get ready for this. I’ve had years of training behind me, it’s a matter of just getting the hours and the rehab in and I managed to.”

“The collarbone is behind me now, even though it’s still sore at times and it reminds me that it’s still there.”

“When it came to this we just had to fight, and we are both just fighters. We have trained damn hard to get here. We have put so much time into this to get here. We just have to really trust what we can do and the experience that we have, and just trust in ourselves and go for it. I always go, whatever will be, will be, as long as you just give your all.”

Also qualifying for the final of their event, Martin Gordon and Eoin Mullen finished fifth in the
Men’s B 1000m Time Trial. The pair recorded a time of 1:01.520.

“It’s just like the one that went this morning, it’s a clean start, four laps of the track, it’s an absolute all-out effort,” said Gordon.

“The tactics are go as fast as you can for four laps, keep it as tight as possible on the lines.”

“Eoin was just saying the lines were tighter on that effort but it was marginally slower. Everyone got marginally slower this afternoon but to back up the national record this morning (when they finished fifth in a time of 1:01.158, setting a new Irish national record in the qualifier), two and half hours later to go three tenths of a second slower it’s backed up, it’s a good result. It shows massive effort on our part. We’re happy with it.”

“We had a bad crash on Monday, we didn’t know if we would be here at all today. Our coaches, our physios, our doctors, our psychologists, the mechanics, everyone who got us on that line today. Where we were on Monday, I would have taken the hand off you for what we just did today.”

Josephine Healion, piloted by Linda Kelly, competed in the same qualifying round of the Women’s B 3000m Individual Pursuit as Dunlevy and McCrystal.

The pair finished in fifth place, narrowly missing out on qualification for the race for Bronze. They stopped the clock in 3:27.425 – a personal best by an impressive eight seconds.

“It was phenomenal,” said Healion, “I am really really happy with that obviously. We were going well in training yesterday. Linda and I are growing all the time on the track – strength to strength so we are really happy with it.”

“It was absolutely fun out there today,” added Kelly. I didn’t want to let GB catch up, so they caught us on the second last lap. We motored and gave it socks and really enjoyed it.”

Damien Vereker and Mitchell McLaughlin were also in action. They finished in tenth place, in a time of 1:06.740 in the Men’s B 1000m Time Trial qualifying round. The pair who are looking forward to focusing on the road cycling events were happy with their performance.

Para Rowing

Katie O’Brien and Tiarnán O’Donnell took to the water again on Sunday morning in the B Final of the PR2 Mixed Double Sculls finishing second behind the Netherlands and ahead of Turkey who took third. With Ukraine taking home gold, ahead of Poland and Great Britain in the A Final, Team Ireland can be proud of an eighth-place finish overall.

“We have to be happy with ourselves,” said O’Brien.

“We know it’s not the dream finish but there are so many positives to take from this.”

“The experience overall has been so intense and a bit of a blur,” added O’Donnell.

“We will take time to look back and plan for what’s ahead but now it’s time to enjoy being Paralympians and I’m looking forward to getting to see some other sports.”

“My heart actually hurts from the love and support we have gotten over these past few days, said O’Brien.

“To see family, friends and neighbours, I couldn’t believe it and I will never forget those moments.”

With thanks to the great media team working for Paralympics Ireland across the venues in Paris. The team behind the team.

 

 

 

 

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