All the Olympics is a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances.
Only three days in, and Shakespeare would have thrown down his pencil already – impossible as it is to capture in words these gusts of raw feeling, the chins up and heads down, the dry eyes and the real tears and other montages of heck that fall in between. And that’s just among the Irish who have made their exits and their entrances thus far.
It’s a reminder, too, that for all the talk about managing expectations, it’s something else to keep a handle on emotions. It also makes one wonder is it wiser to let those emotions fly or somehow suppress them, or should one even begin to try to understand how it feels?
What is certain is there’s no such thing as a dress rehearsal for the moment your Olympic dream turns into a sort of nightmare. Not when the months and often years of mental preparation beforehand is all about ensuring the dream is kept alive. Nothing and everything which happens after that is ever scripted in advance.
It's tough, the biggest fight of your life, and your body lets you down. It's just tough
Evidence of which came throughout Monday in Tokyo, beginning down at the Kokugikan Arena; as fourth seed in the women's featherweight, Michaela Walsh no doubt had expectations of her own going into her last 16 bout against rival Irma Testa from Italy, her reaction to the unanimous defeat afterwards remarkable for its simple composure and enduring pride.
“It was just her day today,” said the 28-year-old Walsh, stoically, frankly up front, before then philosophising a little. “I had my moments in the last round and she had her moments. The unanimous decision seemed a bit unfair in a way. But that’s boxing. I wish her all the best, I hope she can go all the way.
“That’s over and done with now, and we move on to my brother and the rest of my teammates and I will be cheering them all on all the way. I was hoping we could both get medals but unfortunately not, but hopefully my brother Aidan can take home a medal for the Walsh household.
“I just think the 5-0 doesn’t really do the fight much justice but at the end of the day that’s boxing. This fight doesn’t define me. As much as I wanted to win a medal, I will be back again and I still think I’m up there with some of the best in the world in the 57kg category.”
Impressive, on many levels, evidence, too, there's no predicting these emotional moments, mixed or otherwise; for sure not many expected Emmet Brennan, the 30 year-old light-heavyweight from inner-city Dublin, to be cut up so raw in the other extreme, after losing to Uzbeck fighter Dilshodbek Ruzmetov.
“It’s gutting though, absolutely gutting,” he said, using in vain a towel to dry his wet eyes.
"I've Credit Union loans out, I've worked part-time and trained full-time, but my family are the big support... I've been injured for six months. It's tough, the biggest fight of your life, and your body lets you down. It's just tough."
What marked out Jegou's reaction afterwards was anger and frustration first, then the realisation that life, and the sport you play, does not begin or end at the Olympics
Around the same time as Walsh was fighting Testa, Liam Jegou was racing down at the Kasai Canoe Slalom Centre, looking to book his place in the final of the C1 slalom, admitting long beforehand that he had been working closely with a sports psychologist for over a year now, helping him prepare for this very decisive moment.
The first Irish athlete officially qualified and selected for Tokyo, Jegou had already come a long way in getting this far, and after Sunday’s near hiccup in qualifying, he was fifth man out of the shoot, the fastest of them all by nearly two seconds at the three-quarter marker, 21 of 25 gates successfully navigated, before hitting not one but two gates, in immediate succession, which he knew straightaway in his head and heart meant his Olympics were over. He ended up last of the 15 semi-finalists, the 10 of which made the final.
What marked out Jegou’s reaction afterwards was anger and frustration first, then the realisation that life, and the sport you play, does not begin or end at the Olympics. No one has died, even if sometimes it feels that way.
“I was having a great run,” was how Jegou began to spill it all out, “but maybe I switched that mindset of, ‘I’ll just finish it off,’ instead of, ‘I’ll attack the rest’. I need some time to reflect on it, it’s very raw, and right now I’m just really, really gutted. There’s a lot of work put into this, a lifetime of work, so to mess it up there on one of the final gates, I’m disgusted with myself.
“It’s going to be an hour now of me sulking and being a bit pissed off, after that it’s over. I love this sport, and it’s the Games, it hurts, but there’s plenty of other races I’m excited to race this season.”
It's heartbreaking, you put so much into it and it doesn't reward you
Winning a medal previously, it seems, makes no difference, Annalise Murphy equally despondent after her quest to repeat or better her sailing silver from Rio 2016 blown further off course down by Enoshima Island, her total score more than 40 points adrift of the top-10, as she sits 32nd place overall.
“It’s heartbreaking, you put so much into it and it doesn’t reward you,” she said. “I’m pretty upset. In my mind, I thought I’d done everything to prepare really well for these Olympics and it would go really well for me. It makes it even harder when it doesn’t go the way I had envisioned.”
As unchecked raw emotions go, it may be that no other Irish athlete will rival Jack Woolley, who, after losing his opening fight in the Taekwondo, was distraught to the point of pure abandon. Like the others, too, Tokyo shouldn't and won't define his sporting career, not when he's still only 22.
“I hope so, I want to be in Paris, but this has been nine years leading up to this,” Woolley said, losing his fight with what proved to be the last kick of the match, to the head.
“I don’t have much of a social life, I have to put everything on hold. It’s training, training, training. Even my coach has put everything on hold for this, and I feel like I’ve let many people down.”
Only 13 more days to go, plenty more to make their entrances and exits, and that’s before we get into the medal contests.
