No place like home to get lowdown on Beijing

IAN O'RIORDAN ON ATHLETICSFriends and associates insist on bringing me up to date as to what the Olympics - and I haven't the energy to contradict them

CON HOULIHAN always felt he somehow missed Italia 90 because he was away at the World Cup, and I know exactly what he was talking about. My feeling right now is that I missed Beijing because I was away at the Olympics.

Since I arrived home in the wee hours of Monday morning the topic of the Irish athletes in Beijing has been on constant rerun. From the moment I sat in a taxi at the airport, in fact, when the driver asked where I was coming from, as you do, and without thinking I answered, "The Olympics."

Truth is I hardly had the energy to remember where I was coming from, which was fine, because the taxi driver did all the talking. He told me the athletes were useless, were wasting their time out there, with one long excuse after another. Except for the boxers, of course; they were deadly.

"And what about that old bird in the marathon?" he added. "Twenty-something minutes behind the winner."

I wanted to tell him that this old bird had personified the last remnants of the Olympic spirit and he should have seen the reception she got at the finish, but I honestly did not have the energy.

"Twenty-something minutes," he repeated. "What a joke!"

It was at that point I noticed he was driving with one hand, as the other nestled comfortably across his built-in armrest.

Later, on the short walk from the driver's seat to the boot of his taxi, he was visibly out of breath. I couldn't help thinking he'd probably never run to exhaustion in his life.

The plan was to sleep off the rest of Monday, which I more or less did, until the following text message disturbed me: "C U get a mention in letters page of IT."

Turned out a Mr Zachery Stephenson of Chalk Farm Road, Camden, London, had pronounced himself "confused" by one of my columns from the Olympics, headlined "Why does it always have to be about medals?"

Now here's what I'm talking about. Had I missed something in Beijing, because I was away at the Olympics? I was talking about track and field, not boxing or any other Olympic sport, and if people like Mr Stephenson think that not winning a medal in track and field is a monumental failure then I'd like to know where he was sitting during the men's 5,000 metres.

Anyway, the next day I went down to the local barber to get a good trimming. After three weeks on the road I looked like a punk. The barber asked had I been away this summer, as you do, and without thinking I answered, "Just back from the Olympics."

I still didn't have the energy to expand on that, which was fine, because the barber did all the talking. He told me the athletes were very disappointing, well down on personal bests, half of them injured to begin with. Though he thought that sprinter dude did okay.

"You know, we're really missing Sonia O'Sullivan now," he added. "I mean we've done nothing in athletics after Sonia."

I wanted to tell him that since Sonia had bid us farewell in the Athens Olympics, Ireland has won three gold medals at the European Indoors, gold at the World Indoors, silver at the European championships, silver at the European cross-country, gold and silver at the European juniors, silver and four bronze at the World Student Games, and two silver and two bronze at the European Youth Olympics - but I just didn't have the energy.

By Wednesday the energy levels were about restored enough to attempt a long cycle in the Wicklow mountains, which was fine, because the rest of the group did all the talking.

One of them told me how he'd watched every minute of Beijing on television and things just got worse by the day.

"You'd watch the lads on RTÉ and all you'd hear is them giving out," he said. "Then you'd flick over to BBC and all you'd hear is them singing about winning another medal. And we have no one coming through either, do we?"

I wanted to tell him about the 22 athletes we'd sent to the World Junior Championships in Poland, just a few weeks before Beijing, how this was our largest and most successful crop of juniors ever, and that one of them, Brian Gregan, was a serious prospect over 400 metres, but by now my energy levels had fallen back below zero.

Clearly, Beijing viewed through a TV screen was a lot different from the Olympics I had witnessed inside the Bird's Nest. Ireland wasn't the only country struggling to win medals. It was tough out there, and some of our athletes did very well.

On Thursday morning I was pulling up weeds from the driveway of my house, as you do, when a neighbour passed by and asked, "Did you enjoy the Olympics?" I really didn't have the energy to answer, which was fine, because he did all the talking. He told me how RTÉ's coverage was brilliant, especially the lads talking about the athletics.

"Do you know they called Alistair Cragg a loser?" he added. "Very strong stuff, it was."

I wanted to tell him it was I who had actually called Alistair Cragg a loser, but that I didn't mean it, that I was being deeply ironic, that I still believe Cragg is one of the most talented athletes I have ever seen. Had no one sussed that, yet? But I just didn't have the energy to go into it.

Cragg had made a big deal about former athletes criticising the Irish in Beijing instead of offering help. It's a valid point, but former athletes criticising the Irish in Beijing isn't half as bad as hearing it from people who wouldn't be found within 50 miles of an athletics meeting from one four-year cycle to the next, who wouldn't recognise Alistair Cragg if they knocked him off his bike, and some of whom were critising Irish performances while actually in Beijing, despite being away the whole time covering a boxing tournament.

Then yesterday a friend called by wanting to go for lunch in Johnnie Fox's. I told him I'd be maybe half an hour as I finished off this column, so he just lit a cigarette and said, "Sure what are you going to write about now that the Olympics are over?"

I wanted to tell him there was so much more to athletics than just the Olympics; that there is so much going on in the schools and the clubs and among the thousands of people who lace up a pair of runners every day for the pure pleasure of it; that we have a World championships next year and a European championships the year after; that athletics is also about running cross-country and running indoors; that this is still the one sport that everyone can relate to, even if they do so only once every four years.

I'd have told him plenty other reasons why athletics will survive after the Olympics, but I just didn't have the energy.