When Mullingar boomed in Beijing

Annabelle Zurbay is a current Olympian with strong Westmeath connections. Reading about Annabelle on the front page of last week’s Examiner, as I marvelled at her achievement, the story also transported me back almost 17 years to an Olympics where Westmeath punched well above its weight on the international stage.

Olivia O’Leary, one of our truly great journalists, was speaking when I turned on the radio on a recent Sunday morning. When Olivia talks, people listen. This time she was recounting her time as news correspondent in Belfast, when, along with such household names as the late lamented Tommy Gorman, they certainly did their country some service in covering ‘The Troubles’. Olivia mentioned more than once that as a correspondent, she just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

While few will ever equal the contributions of the Gormans and O’Learys, maybe once in a lifetime those of us mere mortals also find ourselves ‘in the right place at the right time’ even if only for a nanosecond.

My ‘right place at the right time’ for good news stories was the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Not only was I in Beijing, but with a share of luck and my hard neck, I found myself at the very heart of all that was going on.

Giddy with pride from having three Mullingar competitors involved and armed with a camera, notebook and new laptop, we filled a page of the Westmeath Examiner with exclusives for two weeks running. A few of those pieces made it to other publications.

My Beijing stint as foreign correspondent came about through my good friend, Seamus Fagan. Seamus’s nephew, Martin, son of the legendary hurler and footballer, Mickey Fagan, and his mother, Marie, was one of our three Mullingar participants. Martin Fagan was a runner while the other two were boxers; John Joe Nevin and John Joe Joyce.

‘Would you be interested in coming to the Olympics?’, asked Fagan over one of our regular cups of coffee. That was as casual and in the same tone as he might have asked, ‘will you come to the match in Portlaoise on Sunday?’.

‘I will,’ I replied, again with as little fuss as going to the match in Portlaoise.

I sat next to Derval O’Rourke in ‘The Bird’s Nest’ watching Usain Bolt ‘showboating’ before he broke world records with consummate ease; I was first to greet Paddy Barnes after he secured a boxing bronze; and I had my photo taken holding Ken Egan’s silver.

But the lingering memories are of pride in our own, making new friends, and taking full advantage of the way the Chinese made a showcase out of hosting the Olympics and bending over back ways to create a favourable impression. It worked with me…! When Seamus told them in the hotel that I was a journalist (!) we got upgraded to two penthouse suites!

Unfortunately, Martin did not perform to anything like his best on the day. These things happen, and we still had our boxers to cheer on. We roared and threw every punch along with the great John Joe Nevin, then just 18 years old – he won a silver medal at London 2012.

John Joe Joyce proved to be one of the unluckiest participants at the games, losing on a dubious split decision to the eventual gold medal winner. The grace and dignity that Joyce showed in defeat made him too a winner in Irish eyes.

I experienced the honour of rubbing shoulders with boxing manager, Wexford’s Billy Walsh, an incredible man who never got the full credit for what he did for Irish sport.

At night we all gravitated to an Irish pub. Yes, even in Beijing, there was an O’Shea’s. Although our hotel was the other side of the city, it only cost a fiver in a taxi. Marty Morrissey was there doing what Marty Morrissey does.

I spent an evening sitting and chatting with one of my idols, Vincent Hogan, and I became friends with our very own late lamented Colm Murray and his lovely wife Anne. Bobby Begley was there and the ‘go to’ man for event tickets… but I always seemed to miss mine by five minutes. However, we all always managed to get in.

Each night, I left O’Shea’s before the others, came back to my room and started writing and filing. This was all new to me and with such a high level of hit and miss, it was miraculous that I got so much stuff off and delivered before going to sleep. The stories weren’t all about the athletes.

I met a lady from Athlone who lived out there. Another local who had made an outstanding career in Beijing was Sean O’Shea from Crowenstown. (No relation to the pub!) Sean took time to take me around, showed me the city and taught me much about their way of life.

I met a lot of winners in Beijing; in fact I never met a loser there!

Don’t Forget

Sometimes we get so worked up over sport, we wish it was only a game.