Ellen Walshe narrowly missed out on a place in the women’s 400m individual medley final on the last day of the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore, finishing ninth overall in Sunday morning’s heats.
The Templeogue swimmer finished fifth in the second heat, touching the wall in 4:38.72.
It was the last swim of a very successful World Championships for the 23-year-old, which saw her reach finals in both the 200m IM and 200m butterfly.
“I probably didn’t expect it to be so fast,” Walshe said of her heat. “I think even when I touched the wall, I was surprised at my time, never mind coming in fifth, but I’ll definitely take it on day eight (of the competition). I’ve had many swims in my system, so I think I said to the team this morning if I could even be 4:41 I’d be delighted, so I think to see a 4:38 on the board, I was pretty surprised.”
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On her overall performance across the meet, Walshe added: “I’m delighted. I’ve had a quite successful Worlds, I’ve made two finals, and I think to come ninth today, I’ll take it. There’s definitely loads of learnings to make as well.”
Ireland was also represented in the men’s 4x100m medley relay, the team finishing 21st overall in 3:37.56.
John Shortt led the National Centre Limerick quartet in the opening backstroke leg, clocking 54.88 before Eoin Corby took over with a 1:01.09 in the breaststroke. Up next was Jack Cassin in the butterfly leg, touching in 52.47 to launch Evan Bailey’s 49.02 in the freestyle anchor leg.
Ireland’s swimming team leader and National Centre Limerick coach John Szaranek commended the swimmers on a successful World Championships.
“Coming into the meet some of the athletes had to deal with injury, illness and disruption to their training. This did not deter the athletes who had an excellent holding camp in Malaysia, and they transferred that momentum into Singapore.
“Adversity was never far away, and illness was rife throughout the largest ever competitive field to assemble for a World Championships. The Irish athletes coped well with the circumstances and should be very proud of their performances across the meet.”
Olympic medallists Daniel Wiffen and Mona McSharry both had difficult outings in Singapore, with Wiffen finishing eighth in Wednesday’s 800m freestyle final – a title he held from the 2024 World Championships in Doha – before withdrawing from his other title event, the 1,500m freestyle, revealing he was dealing with ongoing effects of appendicitis.
McSharry ended her World Championships on Saturday in finishing 25th overall in the 50m breaststroke heats having spent a number of days suffering from a stomach bug.
