Mayo’s Olympic and GAA links celebrated in new podcast
Mayo's Martin Sheridan, one of the stars of the 1908 Olympic Games in London.
Two of Mayo’s most renowned sporting heroes are among a collection of Irish athletes who feature in a new podcast that looks at the fascinating links between Gaelic games and the Olympics.
Hosted by award-winning Sunday Times journalist and author Michael Foley and GAA journalist and historian Cian Murphy, Lords of the Rings: the GAA’s Olympic Story is a five-part series that features some of the many GAA players who have also won gold, silver and bronze while competing on the biggest stage in world sport.
Foley and Murphy are joined by a panel of experts to look at some of the truly weird and wonderful aspects of the GAA link to the Olympics and recall some of the forgotten heroes who played hurling and football and became some of the greatest athletes in the world.
This year marks a centenary of Team Ireland at the Olympics which this year has returned to Paris – and it was there, exactly 100 years ago, where Mayo footballer Seán ‘Baller’ Lavin raced in the 200m sprint just one year after being credited with inventing the solo run in Gaelic football which he performed for the first time in Croke Park in 1923. Lavin also raced the 200m in the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam and in later years became Ireland’s team doctor.
As well as being a brilliant footballer, Seán Lavin was a brilliant handballer too, but switched to athletics after a wrist injury.
Long before 1924 however, the GAA link to athletic excellence was well established. However, forced emigration had brought many GAA athletes to Britain, the US and Canada where they were able to successfully revive their careers. And another Mayo man to feature in Lords of the Rings: the GAA’s Olympic Story is Martin Sheridan who won no fewer than nine Olympic titles for the USA.
The Bohola native was a staunch nationalist and GAA supporter who was given a special reception by the GAA when he made a triumphant return to Ireland after winning his ninth medal at the 1908 Games.
Two other Connacht GAA players featured are Bill ‘Stonewall’ Jackson and John Daly. Jackson won two All-Ireland medals with Roscommon in 1943/44 before lining out for the Irish basketball team at the 1948 Games in London while Galway man Daly won an Olympic silver medal in the Steeple Chase in 1904 and wore a GAA singlet when running the marathon in 1906 in Athens.
Contributors to the podcast include Olympic historians and authors Kevin McCarthy and Tom Hunt, cultural historian and author Siobhán Doyle and Irish Times athletics correspondent Ian O’Riordan who shine a light on the great stories that illuminate the GAA and its Olympics link in this year of milestones.
Lords of the Rings: The GAA’s Olympics Story is a podcast available from gaa.ie, Spotify and usual platforms. It is produced by Andrew Foley, Michael Foley and Niamh Boyle.
