Dream of gold turns into a nightmare

Sport is cruel. For Bridie Lynch this was to be the pinnacle of a marvellous career. A last major championships. Two events entered, two gold medals expected. But Lynch's dream turned to a nightmare: a terrible run of luck left her to return home not in glory but in plaster.

The dream began to sour shortly before she left for Sydney. The news was kept under wraps, but a niggling hamstring injury wouldn't clear up. Lynch was ranked number one in the world in the pentathlon and holds the gold medal in the discus so she was not about to throw the towel in.

Then, with just three days remaining until competition, her world began to fall apart. MRI scans in Australia revealed the hamstring was not just strained, but had actually been badly torn. Any chances of competing in the pentathlon were ruined.

"I was flying at the time," said Lynch. "I was in the best shape of my life . . . I had high hopes and was the favourite."

Lynch has won a medal in every competition she had entered. She was Ireland's sole gold medalist from Atlanta and had been training full-time for the last four years.

The results of the scan results knocked her for six. "I was devastated, that's even an understatement, there's no point saying I wasn't. When you've put in the sort of effort and made all the sacrifices I think you deserve better."

Three days of despair followed. Lynch was inconsolable, and did not leave the Paralympic village. But the Donegal woman has a strong team behind her, and after much soul-searching she decided to go in the discus.

The discipline wouldn't place as much strain on the injury, it was argued. If nothing else it would mean that four years of arduous training would not go down the toilet.

Lynch agreed to go to the training ground on Saturday, throw the discus six times and take it from there. She felt good, throwing in excess of 40 metres in her early efforts. The world record stands at 42.70m, and anything over 38 would guarantee at least bronze. The hamstring wasn't great, but she could fight through the pain, anything just to get that gold.

"I'm a winner," she says. "I don't like second best. I'm sorry if that's arrogant but it's the way I am."

On her sixth and final throw the unimaginable happened. Lynch, who has only partial vision, was totally blinded by the mid-afternoon sunshine, and her effort was a little wayward. The discus flew at one of the uprights holding up the netting, ricocheted backwards and struck her, full force, on the foot.

"There I am, after getting psyched-up, mentally prepared for another competition and then bang," she said. "It was a total freak. I've never heard tell of anything like it in my life."

She had to be stretchered from the arena and taken to the medical centre. She had four broken bones in her foot and one fractured toe. Game over.

With her world turned upside down, plans to retire have now been shelved for at least another two years.

"You don't finish on a championship like this . . . I couldn't leave it here," she said. "I'll live to fight another day, that's all you can do," she said, determined to leave the sport as the best in the world.

"At least I can't say I've had a bad performance," was her novel outlook as she hobbled away, readying herself for yet more work, more seven-day weeks and more medals.