Sam Lynch competed in the men’s lightweight rowing at two Olympic Games – finishing 4th in the coxless four at Atlanta 1996 and 10th in the double sculls alongside Gearóid Towey at Athens 2004.

Described by Neville Maxwell as ‘physically by far the most powerful athlete’ in the Atlanta crew, Lynch brought a ‘wow factor of strength and power’ to a combination that also featured extraordinary technical excellence and rhythm.

His path to Atlanta was an ordeal in itself: training through January 1996 in a regime he described as ‘really, really hard’, constantly breaking down physically, breaking into tears in Sweden before the Cologne regatta and almost quitting. Only John Holland’s intervention – ‘Sam, you’ll be going home on Sunday anyway, so why not wait until then?’ – kept him in the programme.

At Cologne he rowed in the second Irish crew on day one before being placed in the number one crew for day two; the four won by six seconds and the Atlanta crew was selected. In the Olympic final he provided a vivid and painful account: ‘We went out really, really hard and led at 500m but we were just racing, racing, racing and weren’t being economical. We got to 1000m and the Danes and Canadians had moved up on us. We went through 1500 and I thought we’re going to get a medal here, I lifted it and we really went for it but the Americans were rowing us down and there was suddenly honey in my veins. It was a terrible feeling.’

Between the two Olympics, Lynch won World Championship gold in the lightweight single sculls in 2001 and 2002 (Seville) and silver in 2000.

He married Sinéad Jennings, herself a World Championship medallist and Olympian.