We will probably forget about Ian Wiley soon. What was he, after all, in this vast, sprawling, wonderful show-off mess of a festival? Who was the guy that stood on the platform where the water calms in Whitewater Stadium in shorts and shades, his hands cupping his eyes, the way a young father might watch his kids in the sea? He was nothing: a number, a statistic, just another hard luck tale as these Olympics surge remorselessly on.

The world didn't stop for Ian Wiley as he gripped an iron hand-railing, helmet and paddle on the ground, watching his life as an athlete slowly, almost gently, drain away before him. He had made an error on his first run on the 20th gate and after a good second run there was a slim chance that he could creep inside the top 15. But it was only a slim chance.

Paul Ratcliffe, his old pal, his training buddy, torched through the water, strong and precise through the gates, those torturous gates that had deceived Wiley for the last time. A couple of stewards chatted amicably near by.

After Wiley finished his second run, after he kayaked his last in this mocking tournament, these games that have spat back his most gallant shots, he paddled in circles for maybe five minutes, reluctant to get out of the water.

He knew then. The seven canoeists who went after him were all at their peak, all brimming with certainty. Now, looking at them competing, he muttered: "I'm gonna need someone to bomb out if I'm gonna get through." But he was shaking his head. He had bombed. He was the casualty.

He squinted in the sun and his expression appeared good-humoured, like he was smiling. But up close, you couldn't mistake the hurt, the look that said he'd betrayed his own self, burning in his eyes.

The whole thing, it was like the gods were poking fun at him. Maybe if he'd really sunk, maybe if the course had really broken him, then he could walk away with no demons. But this was Barcelona and Atlanta all over again, this was ripping his heart out because of one error and still leaving him close enough to the hot stuff to ensure that the regret, the pain, will be hard to lay to rest.

Ian Wiley was good, see. When he paddled his last yesterday, the announcer, a poppy American, gushed with the same velocity as the rapids about the Irishman's gift, his technical nous, his talent for this lonesome, frothy, underground sport.

But the thing is, it was true, all the platitudes. Someone was saying that when Ian Wiley was practising in Whitewater a few days ago, a couple of guys sat at water's edge with a camcorder. They filmed his every move. They shook their heads in wonderment. They were the same canoeists that would finish ahead of him in this heat.

Because Wiley, they say, was regarded as somewhere beyond mere mortal in his circle. He was what they aspired to.

He will never now wave the medal that would have made him the real thing for those of us who took an interest in his world for 10 minutes every four years. But those who know, those who swallowed the same water and struggled and won and lost together, they reckoned Ian Wiley was something special.

He prepared for these terrible minutes through months and years of training, solitary mornings and afternoons in Nottingham. This was all he'd worked for and now it had exploded in his face.

He was asked to say a few words and obliged.

"I'm shocked. I just can't believe it and I'm very angry with myself. You can't afford to make mistakes like that. That's it. I have had a successful career and great memories from the sport. I didn't get an Olympic medal that was my aim, my goal, but I came close on a number of occasions. It hasn't happened. That's just the way it goes."

Then he said thanks.

There will be plenty of brilliant and glorious moments in Sydney over the coming days, universal, breathtaking feats that will make us forget Ian Wiley. But there will be few more graceful departures. Maybe for that alone, we should remember him.