The world fades to grey when I watch Rhasidat Adeleke - a fizzing, ebony, emblem of an evolving Ireland

It might be an unfair burden to place upon the shoulders of an athlete who simply wants to move like the wind, but as a woman of colour Adeleke is an eloquent Tallaght riposte to the hateful

05:00, 15 Aug 2026

[2026 European Athletics Championships, Alexander Stadium, Birmingham, England 13/8/2026 Womens 200m Final Irelands Rhasidat Adeleke celebrates after winning silver]

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2026 European Athletics Championships, Alexander Stadium, Birmingham, England 13/8/2026 Womens 200m Final Irelands Rhasidat Adeleke celebrates after winning silver(Image: INPHO/Morgan Treacy)

Rhasidat Adeleke devoured the ground below her rapidly spinning legs in the fashion of a thirsty plant hoovering moisture from abundant soil.

Mark English, a Donegal doctor at the opposite pole of his career journey to the coltish Dublin sprinter, strode into golden light, an athlete who had waited and waited for his moment in the sun.

Two emerald-vested chariots of fire, their afterburners blazing, propelling them toward a moment in time.

Thus, a magical night at an arena in England's West Midlands drew Irish hearts into its cape.

Maybe the surge of identity was heightened because I was far from home, holidaying on Italy's Adriatic coast as Thursday's twin acts of unforgettable theatre unspooled.

Whether a moment of supreme sporting or cultural expression - Jesse Buckley announced as an Oscar winner, Troy Parrott sending a surge down the nation's spine, - the emotions are somehow heightened when watching one of our own thrive through a distant, overseas lens.

Or it might be that the contrast with the creaking floorboards of my own tenement body elevates the spectacle of such sleek athletic grace.

What is certain is that watching Adeleke and English twice wrap the European Championships in a billowing tricolour awakened whatever heart muscle pumps pride through the national vein.

English's body language in the moments after his 800 metre moment of glory summoned a passage from Pulitzer Prize winner Colson Whitehead's new novel, Cool Machine.

That the scene involves a veteran criminal, Uncle Rich, describing the feeling that washes over him after the perfect 'job' doesn't in any way cheapen the truth of the words.

"There's what I call 'a moment of radiant calm' in the aftermath. I'd live there forever if I could, basking in the afterglow of a heist."

English's moment was earned not thieved, paid for in currencies of sacrifice, sweat and lonely striving.

[Mark English of Ireland poses for photos following the Men's 800m Final]

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Mark English of Ireland poses for photos following the Men's 800m Final(Image: Getty Images)

Yet it is hardly trespassing on the landscape of his inner thoughts to comment on his radiant calm in the afterglow of becoming a champion of Europe.

A place, like Uncle Rich, he would happily dwell forever.

If English was enjoying the dreamiest night of his sporting life, still the eye was drawn to Adeleke.

There's something about Rhasidat.

The girl oozes star power, a tiara of charisma crowning her chiselled features.

She is somebody destined to live her days at the centre of the photograph.

Elegant, explosive, dazzling, a Gulfstream G700 in female form, streamlined and aerodynamic, engineered to move at speeds that send a sonic boom echoing across the heavens.

There is something else, too.

It might be an unfair burden to place upon the shoulders of an athlete who simply wants to move like the wind, but as a woman of colour she is also a vibrant symbol of a new Ireland.

An ambitious, intelligent, eloquent Tallaght riposte to that hateful zone of overheated, ill-informed digital paranoia.

Among the shining lights of an evolving nation.

Just 23 and with a world of possibility stretching out before her lithe frame.

In full flight, Adeleke is a thrilling sight, irresistible power and balletic movement in perfect harmony.

It is a breath stealing cocktail.

Like, say, the late Phil Lynott on a stage, jewel sparkling in his lobe, he and the music merging into one mighty, leather-trousered force of nature, Rhasidat has that magnetic X-factor.

You watch her and for a few enlivening seconds the rest of the world fades to grey.

[Rhasidat Adeleke crosses the line for a silver medal ]

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Rhasidat Adeleke crosses the line for a silver medal (Image: INPHO/Morgan Treacy)

Eyes are drawn to the liquid movement, her entire form pouring like expensive cognac from a crystal decanter.

Watching Rhasidat streak across the track, dancing to a melody only she can hear, is to understand Don DeLillo's awe in those moments when the human pedal is lowered to the metal.

'Speed is the last excitement left, the one thing we haven't used up, still naked in its potential, the mysterious black gift that thrills the millions."

For much of the past year Adeleke has seemed as desolate and lost as a noun without the companionship of a verb, her life an incomplete sentence.

There she was, enduring the frustration of an artist impatient to unveil to the rest of the world the masterpiece that lives in her imagination.

Injury stalled her progress, temporarily shattering the window pane of her ambitions.

Up until a few days before these championships, she had not been able to run fast enough to achieve the qualifying time to book a seat on the flight to Birmingham.

So to see her on Thursday, an ebony blur, rocketing down the home straight to run the fastest ever 200m by an Irish woman, was both intoxicating and strangely moving.

And, with the 2028 Olympics looming, a reminder of all she could become.

A flowering in the fields of the imagination.

[Rhasidat Adeleke jumps for joy ]

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Rhasidat Adeleke jumps for joy (Image: Godfrey Pitt/Action Plus/Shutterstock)

Missing only the NASA livery, she launched from the blocks on Thursday as if from Cape Canaveral itself.

Shooting for the stars.

Adeleke is a supreme competitor, her days spent prospecting for greatness. Like so many high achievers, she is contemptuous of empty, patronising plaudits.

Yet, on Thursday, as she peeled away the layers elite sportspeople deploy to camouflage their thoughts, one story was narrated by the joy colonising her eyes.

Even for a high-achiever obsessed about squeezing out every blob of potential, silver was on this occasion, given the troubled preparation, as good as gold.

Determined not to be imprisoned by pressure or po-faced goals, Rhasidat was content be a young woman knowing the liberating joy of fizzing like a comet.

"And now I just want to be free. I want to be happy. I want to enjoy this sport," she said, the words as much for her own ears as those of her media audience.

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Her place in life reaffirmed, she sailed away to collect her medal, trailed by the stardust that is her calling card.

And on a distant Italian shore, a heart muscle rose above time's ticking clock.

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[Roy Curtis]

Roy Curtis

Roy Curtis is 2022 Newspaper Columnist of Year and a two-time winner of Sports Writer of Year. He is a regular columnist for the Irish Mirror and Irish Star.

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