Ellen Walshe proudly shows off her gold medal
‘I just kicked like hell’ says golden girl Ellen
Templeogue’s Ellen Walshe finished off her European Aquatics Championship in Poland with a gold medal on the final night of the competition.
The gold in the 200m Butterfly along with her silver in the 200m Individual Medley means that Walshe possesses a sizable chunk of Ireland’s total medal haul of seven alongside Daniel WIffren, John Shortt and Evan Bailey.
Ireland finished fifth on the medal table overall.
Walshe stormed to gold in the Butterfly with a time of 2:03.24 and became the first Irish woman to be crowned a European Short Course Champion, a decade after her first international medal when she won silver at the European Youth Olympic Festival.
Walshe was controlled from the start of the race, turning seventh at 50 metres, she was sixth by 75m and maintained this position up until the last 50m of the race.
It was here that she moved into third place and a further push in the final 25 saw her coming barrelling into first ahead of Danish swimmer Helena Rosendahl Bach in 2:03.55 and Italian Anita Gastaldi in 2:04.07.
A delighted Walshe spoke after the race
“I think it was going to be a big race with the girls tonight, it was a stacked field of fliers, so it was going to be about who had the better backend, you just have to hold on for the first 150m and then just try bring it home the last 50 and that’s just what I did, I just kicked like hell.”
“I think you have to stick to your own process, which is so important to not race anyone else’s race, I know the back end can be strong, the front end, it’s definitely a weakness that I have, I need to get out quicker.
‘It’s something I’m trying to work on it, but yeah, I probably need to be out a bit quicker with these girls and kind of help myself through the back end instead of like hurting so bad, but, yeah, it worked tonight, so it must work.”
Despite winning two gold at the European U23 Championships in Dublin in 2023, it was the first time Walshe stood on top of a podium and heard the national anthem she said ‘I think you got to enjoy these moments because they don’t come very often and I guess to stand on the top of the podium, it doesn’t come often.
Ellen Walshe proudly raises the tricolour after her success in Poland
‘It’s my first gold medal on the international stage; I guess you have to kind of enjoy the moment because it’s over now.
‘It’s over very quickly, but it was great to have the flag and see my parents in the stands.’
On the team’s performances this week Walshe said ‘It was absolutely savage, each and every one of them played a massive part in everyone’s success this week, and I think we all got to kind of drive off that and just use it into the next season.
‘It’s extremely important to keep the energy really high in the team, obviously some results can be disappointing, but we’ve got to use each other and feed off each other through this meet. So, yeah, the team is in a great place, so I’m super excited to see what we got this summer.’
Just thirty minutes after her gold medal win, Walshe was back in the pool for the 400m Individual Medley Final, the gruelling double saw Walshe place seventh in 4:38.51.
As well as the seven podium finishes Irish swimmers have set nineteen Irish Records including twelve senior and seven junior and swam forty-three lifetime bests across the six days.
Speaking at the conclusion of the Championships Interim National Performance Director Andy Reid said
‘This has been an outstanding European Aquatics Short Course Championships for Irish Swimming. Their performances truly speak for themselves. This team has set a new benchmark for Irish swimming, and we are immensely proud of the way they represented Ireland on the European stage.’
Attention now turns to the Irish Winter Championships at the Sport Ireland Campus Dublin from December 12th – 14th where many of the swimmers that represented Ireland this week will be competing.
