Swimming European Championships DAY 5

Grلinne Murphy Wins European Silver Medal

Budapest, 14 August 2010 - 17-year old Grلinne Murphy tonight won silver for Ireland in the 1500m freestyle in Budapest, Hungary on the penultimate day of the European Swimming Championships. Murphy's time of 16.02.29 bettered her heat swim by over 8 seconds and further lowered the Irish National record - and it is the second-fastest 1500m time in the world this year. It is the first Irish medal in swimming at a European Championships in 13 years and Murphy is the only woman behind Michelle Smith deBruin to achieve this magnificent accolade.

Murphy's heat swim (Friday morning) was an out-of-this-world performance in itself and saw the 17-year old swimmer from Wexford destroy the then National record by 18 seconds. Murphy has phenomenally gone on to lower the National record again tonight - making it a 26-second dent on the National record this week, which she set only last year. The biggest threat to Murphy, who went into the race as the number one seed, was always going to be Lotte Friis - the World Champion over 800m freestyle from Denmark and winner of the gold medal here in the 800m on Thursday night. Friis led for the entire race, with Murphy hot on her heals in second position and two-time Spanish Olympian Erika Villaecija Garcia not managing to get past the stubborn Murphy. The race ended in that same progression as it began, and Murphy's focus never faltered

"I just kept focusing on my own race - I didn't allow my head to wander into any of the others lanes to see what they were doing," said a relaxed Murphy. "I took a different approach to my race today as I did in the heats yesterday after discussing race tactics with my coach Ronald, and it really paid off. It felt amazing to win a medal at this kind of event and standing on the podium beside Lotte Friis just felt brilliant!" Murphy's training regime at Swim Ireland's University of Limerick High Performance Centre is under the guidance of Coach Ronald Claes, and is supported by Swim Ireland and the Irish Sports Council.

"I'm really proud of Grainne and am really happy for Ireland," commented the National Performance Director for swimming in Ireland, Peter Banks. "It shows that we can have champions come out of our programme, we can have champions grow up in the system in Ireland and that's with thanks to the work that has gone on over the last number of years in setting up the High Performance Centres - a combination of Swim Ireland and the Irish Sports Council and their support. It's starting to lay the foundation for things like this to happen. We hope this is the start of many young swimmers in Ireland getting excited about the sport of swimming and getting excited about being involved in Irish swimming."

What makes Murphy's achievements tonight even more impressive is the fact that the young teenager, who has not even completed Secondary School yet, just two nights ago narrowly missed out on collecting a bronze medal in the 800m Freestyle final - and two nights before that the Castletroy College student was busy swimming in the 400m Individual Medley final in which she finished 7th. Murphy's tally this week now stands at four National records, one silver medal, one fourth place finish and one seventh place finish. Before today, Ireland had won a total of 9 medals in swimming history; Gary O'Toole (sliver, Bonn 1989), Michelle Smith deBruin (four gold, three silver in 1995 and 1997) and Andrew Bree (silver, Dublin 2003).

Ireland's second Murphy in action tonight was Barry Murphy who swam in the 50m breaststroke final, in the wake of his teammate's sliver medal-winning performance. Barry finished in a disappointing 27.99 - slower than the heats, but none the less deserves the recognition of swimming in a European Championship final.

Issued by Swim Ireland, whose High Performance Programme is supported and funded by the Irish Sports Council

Saturday 14th August Irish Results:
W 1500m Freestyle Final: 1st L. Friis (Denmark) 15.59.13, 2nd G. Murphy (Ireland) 16.02.29, 3rd E. Villaecija Garcia (Spain) 16.05.08.
M 50m Breaststroke Final: B. Murphy 27.99 *8th Place.
M 50m Freestyle Heats: B. Murphy 23.06 (29th place