Ireland's Daniel Wiffen has expressed mixed emotions after winning another Olympic medal. While he's happy with his achievement, he is also disappointed that it wasn’t another gold.
Wiffen won gold for Ireland in the 800m freestyle swimming final on Tuesday, raising expectations that he would make it two golds in a row. However, that wasn't the case on Sunday.
American swimmer Bobby Finke broke the world record with a time of 14:30.67, finishing ahead of Gregorio Paltrinieri of Italy (14:34.55) and Wiffen (14:39.63).
Wiffen's bronze medal means that Ireland has now equaled their best-ever tally from the Olympic Games, with six days left to go.
The elite swimmer also opened up about not winning gold.
"Right now, I'm happy but disappointed at the same time. Looking across the week, I can't be displeased with being an Olympic champion," the 23-year-old told RTE after the race.
DANIEL WIFFEN! ✨
Bronze medallist in the men’s 1500m freestyle!!! A two time Olympic Medallist 🤯#TeamIreland | #Paris2024 pic.twitter.com/VgVdiQIYMM
— Team Ireland (@TeamIreland) August 4, 2024
"With the bronze medal—I know I came into this happy with any medal—but when you win gold the first time you race, you kind of don't want anything less than that.
"But I'm happy. You know, we've never had a medal before in this competition in the Olympics for men, so to come away with two, I'm very happy."
Wiffen also admitted that he just didn't have enough to stop Finke on the day.
"I'm not going to lie; the way I was looking, Greg was kind of blocking Bobby, so I couldn't see him," said Wiffen, who was positioned far away from Finke.
"And when I saw he was ahead, I thought, 'We're going to be in a very painful race now.'
"I did try to dig deep and push it, but I just didn't have enough today."
The Irish swimmer also congratulated Finke on his efforts but claimed he would be back.
"I was so happy; I couldn't dream of an Olympic medal, honestly. Being Olympic champion is like a dream come true. I did have my sights set on a world record, but today wasn't the day.
"Well done to Bobby; he did great to get that world record, but we will be back better next time."
