Irish Examiner view: Our sporting heroes inspire us all
Donegal native Mark English celebrates after winning gold in the men's 800m final at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham. Picture: Sam Barnes/Sportsfile
Now that we have had time to reflect on the magnitude of the wonderful achievements of our athletes at the European Championships, the taste of success is even sweeter.
We celebrate for Mark English. We celebrate for Rhasidat Adeleke. But it is a lift for all of us. Even if it is only with a groan that some of us manage to get up from the couch, we can feel boosted and inspired by their high speed, agility, and brilliance.
We don’t need to imagine ourselves following on their racetracks, but we can certainly feel a sense of possibility about taking on our own personal challenges with a little more vigour, a little more hope.
Mark English was determined to create a new story for himself at a relatively late stage in his career. As the oldest runner in the field in the 800m, he knew where he wanted to be — the top position on the podium — but that meant knowing where he needed to be at every stage in the build-up to the race in terms of his strength and conditioning, his diet, and every micro-detail that needs to be taken in hand for success at this level.
Top sportspeople talk about narrow margins. The difference between first and second requires fine-tuning that must be head-wrecking at times for sportspeople trying to be the best at what they do.
As Mark English said when his dream had finally come true, “I really wanted a gold medal. I really wanted that title. I didn’t want to be an athlete that didn’t finish my career without a title; so honestly, I am just over the moon.”
And in keeping with the dignity of the man, he took time in the immediate aftermath of his success to acknowledge that it belonged not to him alone but to everyone who had worked with him to make it possible. He was also quick to thank his supporters.
“I’ve never been at a meet where there’s been Irish support like this. It is amazing.”
Amazing too is the word for Rhasidat Adeleke. To see her jumping for joy with a silver medal for the 200m around her neck, it is hard to reconcile that with the adversities that she overcame even this year, including two hamstring strains that stole four weeks from her training schedule.
“There were times when I didn’t think I’d be able to come back, but I just keep believing in myself, and this is what happens,” the rising star said.
Coming from different ends of their careers, the message is the same, in terms of overcoming the challenges in front of them wherever they find themselves.
The glittering colours of silver and gold are a beautiful bling in which we can delight and feel proud. But the greater gift that our elite athletes give us is that twinkle in the eye — the uplifting sense that whatever our own personal challenges in terms of health, wellbeing, relationships, work, and play, we could strive a little harder and overcome our own adversities.
Naoise Connolly Ryan walking out of a Chicago courtroom makes for a picture at once tenacious and poignant. As she said herself, Boeing finally, after more than seven years, admitted responsibility for the Ethiopian Airlines crash six minutes after take-off in Addis Ababa on March 10, 2019, with the loss of 157 lives.
That she got justice was down to her own bravery and commitment to see it through. The tragedy is that she still walked out of that court without her beloved husband Mick Ryan. Nothing could change that.
Boeing could have met the matter with more humanity and fairness. One wonders about the decency of an acknowledgement made only after someone like Naoise Connolly Ryan and her legal team fought so tirelessly to put the spotlight on the company’s responsibilities when their wrong had such catastrophic human costs.
Micheál ‘Mick’ Ryan, 39, was one of those who lost his life in the flight. As deputy chief engineer at the UN’s World Food Programme, he had been working in Liberia with Rohingya refugees during the Ebola crisis. Apart from the incalculable loss to Naoise and their two children, and to his wider family, it is impossible to estimate the value his work would have had for so many people in dire circumstances in many parts of the world.
Since the March 2019 disaster, Ms Connolly Ryan has joined the families of the combined 346 people killed in this crash and an earlier Boeing crash to bring them to account.
Ms Connolly Ryan said of the $29m (€25m) damages in the Chicago civil case: “I don’t want this story to be about an amount of money. I would never have taken this civil case if we had achieved justice through the criminal court system, but now Boeing has said they are 100% responsible for the crash. It is on the record at last.”
Boeing would do well to spend a lot less time at corporate round-table meetings designed to minimise its liabilities and instead listen to people like Naoise Connolly Ryan about the human responsibilities it takes into its hands when it brings passengers into the skies.
No one can pretend the Rose of Tralee is some kind of sanctuary where older Irish values and mores are preserved in aspic. The chill winds of racism can find their way through the cracks of everything we do. And so, unfortunately, it is with the much-loved festival.
Comments from the 2018 winner, African-Irish Kirsten Mate Maher, are a stinging indictment, as she says she would not have entered it if she had known what racist sentiment would be piled upon her: “If you really want to see Roses from different communities, then make it an open and safe place for them. Right now, it’s not. And that’s not the Rose of Tralee’s fault — this is the public’s fault and the media narrative.”
Hers is not a lone voice. This year’s Dublin Rose, Suad Mooge, has also had to contend with vile racist abuse. It is heartening to hear of Suad getting support in the community and standing up to it. But nobody facing that should be left to walk alone. Others must stand up too. We in the media, in society at large, and those keyboard warriors who press ‘send’ on the kind of stuff that could damage anybody’s mental health, should listen and learn.
As Kirsten Mate Maher said: “Let’s make a place where it is safe for a woman to put herself out there.”
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