Ireland’s O’Connor wins historic world silver medal

Kate O’Connor, Ireland’s top female heptathlete, won the historic silver medal at the Tokyo World Athletics Championships.

After posting five personal bests over the course of the two competition days, the 24-year-old finished with 6, 714 points, putting her in second place behind American gold medalist Anna Hall (6, 888).

It is O’Connor’s fourth medal in 2025 and Ireland’s first global outdoor medal in the multi-events, first world medal in 12 years, and first international outdoor medal in the multi-events.

After finishing with 6581 points each in a dramatic finish, British competitors Katarina Johnson-Thompson and Taliyah Brooks shared bronze, while Belgian-born, three-time Olympic champion Nafi Thiam, who had been ranked eighth earlier on Saturday, withdrawn.

O’Connor set herself firmly in medal contention at the Japan National Stadium on Friday, recording three PBs in the 100-meter hurdles, high jump, and 200-meter run.

Following a 6.22m long jump, she fell to fourth early in day two, 50 points off the podium.

After the long jump, the Newry-born athlete put on her right knee and performed a superb javelin run with a 53.06m PB on her first throw.

O’Connor ran a stunning 800-meter run for a fifth PB in seven events in two minutes, 9.56 seconds, in the final event.

O’Connor set a new national record at the World University Games for gold outside, winning bronze in the pentathlon at the European Championships, silver at the World Indoors, and silver at the European Championships with the silver medal.

The Commonwealth Games silver medalist finished 14th in Paris after suffering from injuries to qualify for her first Olympics last year, but she has excellent form to kick off the Los Angeles 2028 cycle.

O’Connor won his first world track and field medal in 2013 with a 50km race walk victory, which is also Ireland’s first since Sonia O’Sullivan’s 5, 000m gold in 1995.

Cian McPhillips competes in the men’s 800-meter final at 14:22 BST, giving us another chance to win an Irish medal on Saturday.

The 23-year-old Longford man won his semi-final on Thursday in a new Irish record time of 1:43.18.