Loughnane hangs up walking shoes

Date Published: 14-Feb-2013

CIARAN TIERNEY

APPEARANCES at four consecutive Olympic Games and a silver medal at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin were the undoubted highlights in the glittering career of competitive walker Olive Loughnane, who announced her retirement from athletics on Tuesday.

The 37-year old Loughrea woman had taken some time to consider her position since managing a creditable 13th place finish at the London Games last August, but ultimately took the decision to hang up the walking shoes over the Christmas holidays.

“If I was going to be there I wanted to be competitive,” she told Tribune Sport this week. “Having competed at a high level for so long, I feel I am starting to drift from the pace a bit.

“I have loved it from the start and there has been a great sense of fun from being involved with the other athletes. But I have always been very competitive. I had already decided that London would be my last Olympic Games and that’s just the reality of it.”

Loughnane described herself as a “late developer” to the sport. She had run with Loughrea Athletic Club as a teenager before coaches Mary Barrett and Martin Collins introduced her to competitive walking. Straight away, she found she had a flair for what is a technical, disciplined sport.

She has represented Ireland in the 20km walk at the Olympic Games in Athens, Sydney, Beijing and London – finishing 35th in Sydney in 2000 and registering an excellent seventh place finish in the Chinese capital eight years later, beating her own Irish record by 90 seconds in trying conditions and heavy rain.

Loughnane has set numerous Irish records and enjoyed her biggest moment of glory in Berlin in 2009, when she finished 49 seconds behind Olympic gold medallist Olga Kaniskina (Russia) in the World Championships.

Now living in Coachford, outside Cork, she was delighted that so many friends and family members were on hand to see her cross the finishing line in Berlin.

“It was good for my family to see me win a medal in Berlin, because they have seen me go through so many good and bad times,” she said. “More than anyone, they saw the effort I put in behind the scenes.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.