Cork’s Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy are back to back Olympic gold medal winners.
The Skibbereen pair successfully defended their Lightweight Men’s Double Sculls title in Paris.
It means O’Donovan is the first Irish athlete to win medals at the 3 different Olympic Games.
They are also the final Lightweight champions as this class will not be carried forward into future games.
Italy’s Stefano Oppo and Gabriel Soares took the silver medal with a time of 6:13.33, pipping Greece’s Antonios Papakonstantinou and Petros Gaidatzis in a photo finish (6:13.44).
Speaking to RTÉ after the win, O’Donovan said: “It’s a good day for the Irish”.
He said the pair “stuck with it” and trained hard “against all the odds”.
McCarthy said he had had a “rocky enough” season and that it was “really nice to get a few good races under our belt early”.
“I was trying to keep under wraps the nerves and the doubts, but coming out for the final, there were no nerves,” he said.
“We had some really good rounds and I really felt like we were back at our best for this race. It’s just amazing to be here in front of all our family and everyone supporting us, especially from the club.”
He said it had been “a crazy, crazy journey” over the last few years and deemed it “the privilege of a lifetime” to be rowing with O’Donovan.
Asked about being the first Irish person to medal at three Olympic Games, O’Donovan said: “That’s a fluke in my eyes.”
He commended the support the pair have received from home and in Paris.
“The grandstands were green and there were tricolours everywhere, the French were drowned out. That was really great to see all over from Skibbereen and Ireland, everywhere,” he said.
“Even the French volunteers in the boat park and a load of other countries as well that have crews in this event were really cheering us on this morning and all week so we really appreciate the support. It’s fantastic.”
“Italy out there today were the number one seed. [They] really put it up there and Greece – underdogs like ourselves – also put in a big dig and got up onto the medal podium. Unfortunately Switzerland missed out,” O’Donovan said.
