Olympian Nicola Tuthill keen to move to next level

BY KIERAN McCARTHY

WITH Nicola Tuthill you get the feeling that she’s just warming up.

Because the 20-year-old Kilbrittain athlete looked so comfortable on the main stage in her first Olympic Games, it offers huge encouragement for the journey that lies ahead.

Finishing in 16th place out of 32 competitors in the women’s hammer was a superb result for Tuthill, considering these Olympics were not on her to-do list at the start of the year. Such was her rapid progression, when the opportunity to qualify for the Paris Games came along, she grabbed it.

Kilbrittain’s Nicola Tuthill with her West Cork Sports Star award for the month of June.

‘I was delighted with how it all went. For me, I was just over one metre off a place in the final, and I’m only 20 years old, so it was nice to be in the mix with the best in the world,’ explained Tuthill, whose best throw of 69.90m in her qualifying group was just short of what she needed, with the top 12 rowers across both qualification groups advancing to the Olympic final.

The composure Tuthill showed to regroup after the first of her three efforts hit the net is an insight into her maturity at this early stage of her career. The youngest competitor in the women’s hammer was not fazed by her company or surroundings.

‘In the qualifying round you only have three throws and when the first one went into the net, that was down to two,’ she explained.

‘I went back to my coach (Killian Barry), he said not to worry about it, my warm-up was good, ignore the first throw and it was important that I stayed relaxed and moved on quickly.’

Three-time Irish women’s senior hammer champion Tuthill threw her personal best of 70.32m in late May and since then has thrown 69.76m, 69.85m, 69.09m, 69.33m and 69.90m (twice), just short of breaking the 70-metre barrier again. That will come, given her consistency, and when it does it will elevate her again. In the Olympic women’s hammer final, 11 of the 12 athletes threw over 71 metres with the winner, Canada’s Camryn Rogers, throwing 76.97m.

‘I was looking at the 70-metre line and between the Olympics, Cork City Sports and the Europeans, I was quite close to it again,’ Tuthill said.

‘I would love to break it again, but for me to perform well at the Olympics and get so close to it was encouraging and meant a lot. That is the level – you have to be consistent over that 70 metres. That is the next step. It will take some time but hopefully I will keep building towards that.

‘Every athlete is the same, you are never fully satisfied and are always looking to push yourself that bit further and get more out of yourself.’

The UCD student will return to college in Dublin in the weeks ahead, but even though life is moving on, her Paris adventure will live long in the memory.

‘It was amazing, the stadium (Stade de France) was huge, it was packed all the time and there were Irish flags in every corner, the Irish support was incredible,’ she explained.

After her event was finished, she stayed in Paris to soak up the Olympic experience – the Bandon AC rising star was in the Stade de France to watch the Irish women’s 4x400m relay team (including her club-mate Phil Healy) in their Olympic final, she cheered on Rhasidat Adeleke in her 400m final, as well as Kate O’Connor in the heptathlon, and many other Irish athletes in action, too. Memories to last a lifetime, like her homecoming in Kilbrittain.

‘That meant so much, Kilbrittain is a small parish so to see the amount of people who came out to support me meant a lot,’ Tuthill added, and you get the feeling the good people of Kilbrittain will host plenty more homecomings for their local star in the years ahead.

With hammer athletes not hitting their prime until their late 20s/early 30s, the best is yet to come. Nicola is just getting started.

• Nicola Tuthill received a West Cork Sports Star monthly award (June) on Tuesday night in recognition of qualifying for her first Olympic Games.