{"id":78063,"date":"2025-09-22T02:56:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T02:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/78063\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T02:56:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T02:56:13","slug":"kate-oconnor-dreaming-bigger-again-after-perfect-season-ends-in-tokyo-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/78063\/","title":{"rendered":"Kate O\u2019Connor dreaming bigger again after perfect season ends in Tokyo \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The last thing Kate O\u2019Connor <\/a>will be thinking about right now will be any more running, jumping or throwing. Well before her silver medal heroics in the heptathlon, she\u2019d already planned a few weeks travelling around Japan<\/a>. And now that her dream year is complete, that will feel impeccably well timed. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Connor also knows it won\u2019t be long before people are thinking about what she does next. Starting with herself, then her father and coach Michael, and the rest of the coaching and backup team, including Tom Reynolds, Dave Sweeney and her physio Kerry Kirk.<\/p>\n

Her World Championship silver in Tokyo <\/a>brought her medal tally from her four multi-event competitions this year to the perfect score of four. It started with her breakthrough indoor performances in the pentathlon back in March when, just 12 days apart, she won the bronze medal in the European Indoor Championships<\/a>, then upgraded to silver on the World indoor stage.<\/p>\n

They were the first senior medals won by any Irish athlete in a multi-event, and O\u2019Connor then made another breakthrough in the heptathlon, winning gold at the World University Games in July, where she improved her Irish record to 6,487 points.<\/p>\n

After improving that record to 6,714 points in Tokyo, O\u2019Connor has already raised the bar significantly going into 2026, where the two big competitions already in the diary will be another World Indoor Championships in Poland next March, then the European Championships in Birmingham next August.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s already got some added incentive for Birmingham, after missing the last two European Championships in 2024 and 2014. <\/p>\n

She also knows it won\u2019t be long until people start talking about Los Angeles in 2028. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe indoor season was a complete dream, but I wanted to show I could really carry that form into the outdoor season,\u201d O\u2019Connor said of her motivations coming to Tokyo. \u201cMy expectations for myself changed this year, and they\u2019ve probably changed again now. I think I\u2019ve set myself up really well for the next three years, heading for the Olympics, and I\u2019m prepared to put my head down and work really hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year O\u2019Connor also became Ireland\u2019s first representative in the Olympic heptathlon, where she finished 14th. Still, she\u2019s stepped things up considerably since \u2013 pointing towards the higher expectations she\u2019s set for herself, but also the expectations of the team around her.<\/p>\n

At 24, she\u2019s the same age as Anna Hall from the US, who won the gold in Tokyo on 6,888 after leading the way from the second event. There was a tie for third between Taliyah Brooks of the United States and defending champion Katarina Johnson-Thompson of Britain, both on 6,581. <\/p>\n

\"SilverSilver medallist Kate O’Connor, gold medallist US athlete Anna Hall, and joint bronze medallists US athlete Taliyah Brooks and Britain’s Katarina Johnson-Thompson on the podium. Photograph: Getty Images <\/p>\n

Johnson-Thompson is 31, Brooks is 30, at the latter end of their careers, although Johnson-Thompson will definitely be back for more glory in Birmingham.<\/p>\n

Going into the last of the seven events on Saturday, the 800m, O\u2019Connor only needed to run close to her personal best of 2:10.46 to seal the silver medal.<\/p>\n

Despite nursing a knee injury sustained in the long jump earlier on Saturday, she once again improved her lifetime best to 2:09.56.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Connor had produced her fourth personal best in the javelin just over two hours before the 800m. <\/p>\n

And despite the injury scare, she wasn\u2019t even thinking about not starting the 800m. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo, never, and I was never going to just settle for a bronze medal either. That was probably the easier option, but I was always going to fight 100 per cent to the line, sore knee or not. And I managed to pull another PB out there [in the 800m].\u201d<\/p>\n

She was also quick to credit her coaching team, once again, highlighting the importance of being in the optimal training environment, no matter where that is. Back in 2020, O\u2019Connor had initially planned to go to the University of Texas at Austin, where Rhasidat Adeleke has pursued her career, before deciding she would be better served by staying at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a team around me and they don\u2019t just support me as an athlete, they love me as a person,\u201d she said. \u201cThere\u2019s times my mind is full of doubt but with people like that around, they fill you with what you need to be filled with.<\/p>\n

\u201cYesterday [Friday] I enjoyed every single second of the competition, today not so much so. I hurt my knee in the long jump, and it was just a real fight to the line. In the javelin, I did one warm-up throw and was just hoping for the best.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the team around me filled me with so much confidence today, because I didn\u2019t have a whole lot of confidence after the long jump. I wasn\u2019t really able to run, to walk up and down stairs, and yeah, it was just pure grit and determination and want for a medal that I managed to pull myself through.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her silver medal indoors ended the 19-year wait since Derval O\u2019Rourke last won a medal for Ireland on that stage, with her gold in the 60m hurdles in 2006, O\u2019Connor also becoming only the third Irish woman to win a World Indoor medal after Sonia O\u2019Sullivan and O\u2019Rourke.<\/p>\n

Now just the sixth Irish athlete to win a World Championship medal outdoors, the question some people are asking is not if but when her next medal is likely to come. Watch this space.<\/p>\n

Kate O\u2019Connor\u2019s national heptathlon record (6,714 pts)<\/b><\/p>\n

100m Hurdles: 13.44 PB<\/p>\n

High Jump: 1.86m PB<\/p>\n

Shot Put: 14.37m<\/p>\n

200m: 24.07 PB<\/p>\n

Long Jump: 6.22m<\/p>\n

Javelin: 53.06m PB<\/p>\n

800m: 2:09.56 PB<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The last thing Kate O\u2019Connor will be thinking about right now will be any more running, jumping or…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,10889,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,9715],"class_list":{"0":"post-78063","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-kate-o-connor","17":"tag-latest-news","18":"tag-latestnews","19":"tag-main-news","20":"tag-mainnews","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories","24":"tag-world-athletics-championships"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}