Mona McSharry has won a historic Olympic bronze medal at the Paris Olympics tonight.
The 23-year Sligo woman turned a mere Monday into a Mona Monday by finishing third in the 100m breaststroke final at the Paris La Défense Arena in the French capital
The Irish fans in the packed arena celebrated the historic moment in style when the official announcement came to confirm the result for Irish swimming.
The Olympic record holder Tatjana Smith from South Africa tool the gold in 1:05.28 ahead of China’s Qianting Tang (1.05.25) while McSharry, who was second at the turn, held of Italian Benedetta Pilato to take the bronze in 1:05.59.
McSharry set a new personal best and Irish record of 1:05.51 in the semi-final and she held her form in the final in which the big surprise was the failure of world record holder Lilly King to make an impact.
McSharry is Ireland’s first medal winner at the Paris Games, the first Irish medallist in swimming since Michelle Smith in Atlanta in 1996, four years before the Grange woman was born. She becomes Ireland’s 39th Olympic medalist since Dr Pat O’Callaghan won the first at the 1928 Games in Amsterdam.
"I’m very excited,” said McSharry, moments after her bronze medal success.
“I don’t think it’s fully sunk in yet that I’ve actually won a medal. I think once I get up on the podium, it’ll all become real. I think it’s just amazing because years of hard work have paid off, and it just feels amazing.
“A little bit of relief, a little bit of ‘Wow, OK, this is actually happening, and then just really excited to be in that position,” said Ireland’s newest Olympic medallist
She admitted she was unsure where she had finished at the end.
“I could see the Chinese girl beside me and so I knew she was ahead of me. So I was like, ‘Right, I need to try and catch her because if she’s ahead then, I don’t know what’s going on the other side, I can’t see that.
"I had a bad first 50, my goggles filled up with water a little bit, so not a perfect race, but I think it just shows that you’re in it until the end, you just have to keep going.
“I was like, ‘I’m not giving up, I’m going, I’m going’. I think there was 0.1 between me and the next two swimmers, so that’s kind of crazy. But that’s what racing’s about, close finishes,”
As a five-year-old, she had to be rescued by her father after falling into a lake while on holiday in Austria. This prompted her parents to enroll her in swimming classes
A student at Tennessee University in the United States, McSharry was eighth in the Olympic final three years ago in Tokyo when she became the first Irish swimmer to reach an Olympic final since 1996.
She has always been a high achiever in her chosen sport. At the age of 15, she was just under a second shy of the time required to make the Rio Olympics. A European junior champion at the age of 16 in the 50m breaststroke, she was crowned a world junior champion in the 100m breaststroke shortly after her 17th birthday.
Mona McSharry’s home town erupts as Sligo swimmer claims Ireland’s first medal of Paris Olympics
But nothing compared to what she achieved tonight in the City of Light. Majestic Benbulben will be casting a benign eye on her home village of Grange in honour of their most famous daughter.
Earlier in the pool, Dubliner Ellen Walshe finished eighth in tonight’s 400m individual medley final.
The 22-year-old Dubliner became only the third swimmer in Irish history to reach an Olympic final, and although she couldn’t match the pace of the medallists, it was a huge learning experience for the Templeogue swimmer.
For much of the race, she was involved in an individual duel with Japan’s Mio Narita, swimming in the adjoining lane, but she was overtaken by Narita on the final freestyle leg of the medley.
Walsh’s finishing time of 4.40.70 was marginally slower than the 4.39.97 she set in the morning semi-final.
As expected, Canada's world record holder Summer McIntosh took the gold medal in 4:27.71, outside her record, with the US pair Katie Grimes and Emma Weyant taking silver and bronze, respectively. McIntosh’s winning time was 12.99 seconds faster than Walsh's.
At a packed La Defense Arena in the French capital, Walshe lined up in lane one having the second slowest time of the eight finalists.
Walshe, who swims alongside her Irish team-mate Mona McSharry at the University of Tennessee, finished 19th in the 200IM at the Tokyo Games three years ago. So the European U-22 double gold medallist has made significant progress since and will treasure this night as she looks forward to the LA Games in four years.
After the race, a visibly frustrated Walshe said: “It was super exciting to be there. It’s not exactly the performance I would have dreamed of, but, yeah, delighted.
"I would have expected to have a slightly stronger swim tonight, but I just don’t think my legs were up for it.
“I hope to look back later in life and say that was incredible. Tonight was fantastic. I would have liked to have been a little quicker, but it wasn't to be.”
There was no joy, however, for Ireland’s Danielle Hill 100m backstroke. Hill finished eighth in 1:00.80 marginally slower than the 1.00.40 she swam earlier in the heats. It was outside her personal best of 59.11 and wasn’t fast enough to secure her a place in the final.
