*Pat McMahon.
LISCANONR honoured one of its greatest and most proud sons with Olympian Pat McMahon heralded for his achievements.
As he returned home to Clare for a family wedding, Pat was the toast of Liscannor with a commemorative plaque unveiled in Liscannor Community Centre on Thursday evening.
Described as “Ireland’s first genuine world-class marathon runner,” Pat represented his country in the 1968 Olympic Games held in Mexico City. Competing in a very challenging race at high altitude, in which eighteen starters failed to finish, Pat produced a remarkable performance to finish twelfth in the marathon.
At eighty four years young, Pat was humbled to be honoured in his native place surrounded by family, friends, supporters and the community of Liscannor for a heart-warming occasion which concluded with a rendition of what else but ‘Liscannor Bay’ by Mia Cronin. Among those in attendance were Catherine Tiernan, Commercial Director for the Olympic Federation of Ireland, Cllr Joe Garrihy (FG) and well-known Liscannor locals.
Addressing the crowd, Pat thanked everyone for the accolade. “I came home for a special occasion and it turned into two, my niece Margaret is getting married on Saturday and I have the pleasure of waking her down the aisle. Everything has been top secret since I came home two days ago. I got a lot of awards but nothing like this”.
Paddy Brassil, a long-time supporter of Pat’s made the journey from Cork to attend the event. The duo met for the first time seven years ago but Tulla native Paddy had followed Pat’s career, taking newspaper cuttings from all his appearances in the media.
Moving to England was a turning point in his athletics career where Jim Hogan became a mentor, Pat recalled while also touching on the disappointment of losing the Egg and Spoon race at the Sandfield sports day in North Clare.
Arriving for the Olympics in “super shape,” part of his preparation included winning a marathon in Kansas, “I won but I walked the last three miles”. Altitude during the 68 Olympics made matters difficult for all athletes, “I took an awful beating and it took me a whole year to get back in form, it took so much out of us, I recovered and I started winning”. He did bounce back and finished second in the 1971 Boston Marathon, just five seconds behind winner Álvaro Mejía
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Pat admitted, “I’m very emotional with all my relatives, we’ve a big wedding so they are all here, I live in America and I don’t get to see them too much, this was tough to go through. They did a great job to recognise me, they were running out of time because I’m almost eighty five so we’re lucky we did it now. What a night especially with all the people coming up, it was really emotional”.
Returning to Liscannor every year is important for Pat and his wife Kathy. “It is home, we come through Shannon Airport and the guys says welcome home with the passport, sometimes as I’m flying over I joke that I could stop off at the Cliffs of Moher and walk the rest of the way, Liscannor is home, you can take the man out of Liscannor but you can’t take Liscannor out of the man. It is nice to see all the people who I went to school with, it has been fairly emotional to go through this evening”.
McMahon extended thanks to all those who helped throughout his successful career. “I never look back that much, it is over, when I really got good I got injured so what is the point looking back, I had a good run and I was thankful for that, a lot of people get injured and don’t get as far as I did. It was destiny, everybody was there to help me including my coaches, there was always help along the way, Jim Hogan was a two-time Olympian and he coached me in London, he was at the Olympics in Mexico with me, he was my mentor, he ran for Ireland in the 64 Olympics, I never beat him but if we ran the marathon together in 68 I would have, he ran the 10,000m, he helped me big time in my career with coaching and mentoring. There was always somebody along the way to help”.
Having served as an inspiration in the past, the presence of Pat’s plaque could yet inspire the next generation of Liscannor runners. “I know there’s some girls in Liscannor that are awesome runners, they are really promising. They have an opportunity which I didn’t have, luckily I went to London and ran with an elite team because here in Ireland there was nothing for us, races were down in Feakle and Tulla, nothing up here so I had to ride the bicycle down to compete and that was too far”.
His advice to aspiring Olympians is, “Follow your dream, you really can do it even though it is long odds, you can’t give up, if you have the dream you can get there, it happened to me because I dreamt of going to the Olympics when I was ten years of age, we had no radio or television but when Ronnie Delaney won the Olympics I heard about it and I said to myself ‘I’m going’, I didn’t really want to tell anyone else because they would think I’m cracked”.
Having made the journey to Liscannor, Tiernan and Brassil were presented with a St Brigid’s Cross as a reminder to St Brigid’s Well which Bryan Curry of Liscannor Community Development Group noted is “a special place in our parish which I am led to believe Pat walked to yesterday through the fields” and also a gift of ‘Aill na Searrach’ soap from the Moher Soap Company.
Kathy McMahon was presented with the same soap and a Connemara Wishing Stone, “we hope it will serve as a nice reminder of your homeplace in Connemara and also grant you with all the good things you and your family may wish for. Thanks for looking after our Olympic Hero so well Kathy,” Bryan stated.
As Team Ireland’s 256th Olympian, Pat was presented with a green ‘Team Ireland’ jacket. “We hope you will take great pride enjoyment out of wearing it Stateside and we hope you enjoy wearing it around Liscannor too. As a keen golfer Pat, I’m not sure if this is the green jacket you were dreaming of but hopefully you enjoy it none the less”.
