Donal McCarthy travelled to the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games as a substitute member of the Ireland men’s 4×100 metres relay squad, one of two travelling reserves alongside Mark Howard for a squad also comprising Paul Brizzel, Gary Ryan, Tom Comyns and John McAdorey.

The Irish team set a new national record of 39.26 seconds in their heat – a record that still stood more than two decades later. McCarthy was one of Ireland’s leading short sprinters and was part of a strong Irish sprinting cohort in the late 1990s and early 2000s that regularly competed on the European Grand Prix circuit.