Ireland Resets Men’s and Women’s National Records in 4×100 Medley Relays

Ireland has had a phenomenal showing at the Paris Olympics, with their first medalists since 1996 and multiple national records broken across the past eight days of swimming. Daniel Wiffen took home his first gold medal in the 800 freestyle in an Olympic record time of 7:38.19, becoming the first-ever male medalist to represent Ireland. He is the top seed going into the 1500 tomorrow night, and he looks to take home another medal for his country. Mona McSharry became the second-ever Irish woman to earn herself a medal (behind Michelle Smith in 1996) placing third in the women’s 100 breaststroke. Ellen Walshe finaled in the 400 IM, Danielle Hill and Thomas Fannon made semifinals in the 100 backstroke and 50 freestyle respectively, and the Irish women finished 16th in the women’s 4×100 freestyle relay. There’s no denying Ireland has had one of their best meets in the country’s history, especially looking at their results from day eight’s prelims session. 

This morning, Ireland continued their historic Olympic run with two new national records and a pair of 11th place finishes, in both the women’s and men’s 4×100 medley relay.

MEN’S 4×100 MEDLEY RELAY

The men’s team of Connor Ferguson, Darragh Greene, Max McCusker, and Shane Ryan swam a time of 3:33.81. Shane Ryan’s freestyle split of 47.21 was the fastest in the prelims field this morning, closing out the Irish relay to finish 11th overall. 

The previous Irish men’s record was a 3:34.62, set at the 2021 Budapest European Championships. The only swimmer in the same position in the relay is Darragh Greene, who had a slightly slower split than his breaststroke leg from Euros in 2021. Shane Ryan, now swimming freestyle instead of backstroke, swam 1.47 seconds faster than his European Championships counterpart, dropping a quick 47.21. Jack McMillan, the freestyle leg on the previous relay, now competes internationally for Great Britain. Max McCusker, the Irish record holder in the 100 butterfly, split nearly a second faster than Brendan Hyland. Hyland retired from the sport in early 2023. Connor Ferguson, swimming backstroke, was around three quarters of a second off of Ryan’s leadoff leg. This year’s team knocked 0.81 seconds off of the previous record.

SPLIT COMPARISON

WOMEN’S 4×100 MEDLEY RELAY

The team of Danielle Hill (1:00.84), Mona McSharry (1:05.38), Ellen Walshe (58.01), and Grace Davison (55.89) swam a time of 4:00.12. Supplemented greatly by Mona McSharry’s monster 1:05.38 breaststroke split, the Irish women took home a new national record of their own just minutes after the men did the same, finishing 11th overall. McSharry’s split was the fastest in the prelims field, just like Ryan’s. 

The previous Irish women’s record was a 4:01.25, set at the 2023 Fukuoka World Championships. Both teams are the same, with the exception of the freestyle leg. Hill, McSharry, and Walshe were all faster than their previous splits. Grace Davison and Victoria Catterson swam on the 4×100 freestyle relay for the Irish women, but Davison outsplit Catterson by 0.23, swimming a 55.44 to Catterson’s 55.67. This year’s team dropped 1.13 seconds off of the previous record. 

SPLIT COMPARISON

Irish Records, sourced from Swim Ireland’s website