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The greatest Games ever
Something forlorn and regrettable happened here last night. The greatest Olympics we have ever seen - and perhaps ever will - came to an end.
Bigger battles to be fought
IT won't change him. Of that he is certain. Kenny Egan stood in the basement of the Workers' Gymnasium on Friday evening and invited those present to shake the hand of the man who had qualified for the Olympic light heavyweight final. He rapped and he rolled. He bounced and jabbed witticisms into the night air. Same old Kenneth Egan. Same as he always will be.
Golden dream that ended in nightmare
WHEN they appear, we like our doping stories to be cut and dried. A top athlete testing positive for 100 times the legal limit of testosterone; a Tour de France cyclist caught with a phial of EPO in his saddlebag. They can vehemently proclaim their innocence, blame an administrative error or a sinister conspiracy and we can turn a deaf ear, safe in the knowledge that against such proof there can be no defence or redeeming caveats.
Baton passed to London after Beijing's magical show
These Olympic Games, the strangest and perhaps the most beguiling of the 29 held so far, did not just belong to Michael Phelps. Or Usain Bolt. Nor did the hosts have total ownership of a spectacle that cost them €25bn, a budget that surely will never be matched in our lifetime, unless the London 2012 organisers overstep the mark even more hopelessly than they have already done.
Another disastrous blot on Ireland's copybook
D enis Lynch wasn't the only one who was "shattered" by the news that his Olympic horse, Lantinus, had tested positive for a banned substance during competition in Hong Kong last week. The Irish public, and the showjumping community in particular, groaned in agony as once again an equestrian competitor attracted headlines for all the wrong reasons.
How much do you want to believe?
FOR the most sensational track racing this year, you have to look not to the Beijing Olympics, but to the Russian track and field championships staged in Tatarstan a month previously. Take the heats for the women's 800m in which nine competitors ran under two minutes. To put it in context, Yekhaterina Kostetskaya, who didn't qualify for the Games, ran 1:56.67, a time that would have earned her the bronze medal in Beijing.
The real secret behind the stunning success of our boxers
Eileen O'Keeffe always knew she was going to need a miracle on her side to make a splash at the Olympics.
The Big question: Abiding Irish Olympic memory: Ring-masters or equine fiasco?
Were our expectations too high going to Beijing?
Drug-free ways to make a splash in sport
As world records drop like flies in Beijing, there has been the usual speculation about the use of performance- enhancing drugs.
Beijing Diary: 'Loughnane scarf' ensures Costin is the coolest athlete in Beijing
NOT only was Irish race-walker Olive Loughnane only the 13th Irish athlete to clinch an Olympic top-eight finish here but it seems she's also an inventor.
Beijing best?
Were the 2008 Beijing Olympics the greatest ever?
Editor's Choice
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Hession's metre from immortality
One metre between Paul Hession and athletics history
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Isinbayeva makes short work of rivals
Another world record triumph
Columnist Comments
• Wenger puts his finger on the 'wretched truth' behind Olympic success
Arsenal's French manager Arsene Wenger is not xenophobic -- he has proved that in his long years irrigating English football with the finest skill -- but he was maybe the most damning witness of all amid the fanfare which greeted Great Britain's medal haul in Beijing.
• Egan shines so brightly amid Irish 'flap and fuss'
In time, Beijing will recede to memory, sluicing its traffic back onto gasping streets, re-opening its power-plants, restoring the air to a heavy, brown soup.
