SOMETIMES there is no option but to hold up your hands to superhuman effort.
Daniel Wiffen arrived at La Defense Arena on Sunday evening confident he was going to add 1500m gold to the 800m medal mined on Tuesday. This, more than any other, was the one he really wanted.
On a high from his own podium-topping triumphs, followed by Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy on Friday, then Rhys McClenaghan on Saturday, nobody dared doubt him.
The 22-year-old had looked peerless in Paris - but American Bobby Finke wasn’t going to chance leaving his famous kick until the last this time around.
The defending Olympic champion set an incredible pace from the off, maintained his lead throughout and finishing in a world record smashing time of 14:30.67, breaking the previous record set by China’s Sun Yang at London 2012.
Italian Gregorio Paltrinieri managed to stay on his tail, but Wiffen simply had no answer. After his heat on Saturday morning, the Armagh man admitted he still felt fatigued from the 800m final. That sleep had been a problem.
Those exertions clearly took a toll as he never threatened Finke, though Wiffen did hold on to add bronze to gold; not a bad haul at his second Olympic Games.
“Overall I’m very pleased with my week. I wish it was reversed, that I won the gold on the last night and the bronze on the third day,” he said.
“I walked out and felt like I was in the best shape of my life… 300 metres in I see a leg kick out about two, three metres ahead and I was like, ‘okay, this is going to be very painful now’. And I was trying to dig deep, trying to push it on.
“I was catching in the middle and then, to be honest, I just kind of blew up. I was looking around a lot and my skills were absolutely terrible at the end as well because I was just on my ass dying.”
The emotions of the week, though, were like nothing he had ever experienced before. That’s why he is not sorry to see the back of La Defense Arena, despite the hugely happy memories it holds.
“The week itself has been probably one of the most emotionally draining experiences I’ve ever gone through.
“And to be honest, I know I come across that I don’t get nervous, but I was just shitting myself when I’m walking out every time. I’m so happy to be done because I don’t have to deal with these nerves for a long time now, until the next competition.
“I’m pretty proud of myself that I was able to walk out and put together two good performances in finals.”
And, no matter what happens, there remains no bigger fan, and no keener critic, than twin brother Nathan.
Watching from the front row of the arena, the pair caught each other’s eyes after the medal presentation – and Daniel was anticipating a tough conversation to come.
“Nathan was giving me this stare and I was like ‘woah, what are you talking about here, I’ve got a bronze medal, leave me alone’,” he smiled.
“Nathan’s probably disappointed. I didn’t really say much because we know we both want gold and obviously came a bit short with bronze, but we’ll look over the whole week.
“Obviously Nathan’s going to be a massive critic to me… I’ll talk to him after this and see what he’s thinking. He’s thinking probably the same thing as me that, damn, I missed an opportunity there because I didn’t see him.
“I don’t know what else to say… we won gold, we won bronze, we got two medals. My family were still very happy, I’m sure they’re proud of me - I’m just going to show them the gold medal and not the bronze when I see them.”
Now, the future awaits.
Given the physical toll the week - and particularly Sunday night’s race - has taken, there were doubts over whether Wiffen would go ahead with his plan to compete in Friday’s 10,000m marathon swim in the River Seine.
But, he insists, his Paris Olympic journey is not over yet.
“Yeah, I’ve still got my sights on the marathon swimming.
“Obviously it’s my first ever race, but I’m still going in with high expectations, don’t get me wrong. I want to be on the podium still for my first time, that would be pretty unbelievable, but we’ll see what happens.
“Open water is very tactical, it’s not really about speed or endurance or training. It’s really just about the racing.
“I’ve decided that I’m not going to swim in the Seine until race day; I don’t want to have to deal with any illness before the race. It’s going to be a very new thing because I’m going in blind, it’s going to be a fun one.
“I’ll hopefully be getting in [practice] with some of my training partners who are doing it, trying to throw some elbows and really practice somebody hitting me in the face, because I’m sure it’s going to happen.”
