'There is nowhere else I'd rather be': Teresa McDaid

This week at the Stade de France, Teresa McDaid sometimes draws from a previous incarnation.

In 2010, the Letterkenny woman took an early redundancy package from the HSE to focus on athletics coaching.

Some raised their eyebrows, but McDaid had a plan.

The manager now of the Irish Athletics team at the Olympic Games in Paris, she still thinks back to her days in the manic world of Letterkenny University's emergency department.

“I see a lot of blood, sweat and tears – just like when I worked in casualty on Saturday nights,” McDaid tells Donegal Live.

“In the HSE, I worked in litigation, risk management and complaints. The game face was on a lot there.

“I often say that the skills I learned working in an acute hospital and stressful areas, like the emergency department, gives very transferable skills. I have brought that from the HSE.

“Organisation is key to everything. One thing I have learned is that something can always go wrong and it's how quick you can find a solution – and find the best solution – while also not forgetting to do something else that should've been done.”

McDaid arrived in the Olympic village on August 29, not long before swimmer Mona McSharry won bronze in the 100m breaststroke. Her room is on the sixth floor and the shouts of joy from the floor above, where athletes gathered in a communal area to watch McSharry, confirmed a medal for the product of Marlins Swimming Club in Ballyshannon.

The athletes under McDaid's watch come at different times, depending on the start time for their own event.

“There are a lot of moving parts and a lot of moving people,” she says. “The first thing is to get them settled in and make sure that they have everything that they need. We have event leads for endurance, sprints, field events so staffing is one way of putting a big part of what I do.

“I make sure they're covered by a member of staff, a coach and a physio.”

She touched down in Fontainebleau for the pre-Olympic camp on July 19 having visited the site four times previously.

“We needed to do something and Athletics Ireland and the rowing did their own camps to acclimatise to the heat,” she says. “Everyone has 10 days in the camp and then four days in the village before their event.

“When the competition starts, it really gets busy. You need to make sure athletes and coaches know where the call room is, where the warm-up area is; simple things, but so important.

“There is communication from World Athletics or anything to do with competition, it comes to me and it's up to me to disseminate to the relevant person.”

Teresa McDaid with Kelly McGrory and Athletics Ireland President John Cronin, a native of Downings

A total of 23 athletes were selected for the Olympics this year.

McDaid knows there is a weight of expectation in some instances, particularly Tallaght sprint star Rhasidat Adeleke. The 21-year-old Dubliner is a medal hope in the 400m and may also spearhead the women's 4x400m relay charge.

McDaid, who describes herself as “very much athlete focussed and performance focussed” likes to base herself in the warm-up area for the events involving Irish athletes.

“There can be a lot of balls in the air at the one time,” she says. “You have to make sure they get back out, help them come back down and get ready again - that's a massive part of it. And, depending on how things go, you can end up doing pastoral care at times.”

The recent successes of the relay teams, not to mention Adeleke's individual silver in the 400m at the European Championships in Rome, has elevated hopes.

“We have every right to be hopeful now,” McDaid points out. “We do have to manage expectations. Rome was the Europeans and worlds are a different level and the Olympics are a different level again.

“Go back to Budapest and the World Championships: We had two fourths (Adeleke and Ciara Mageean) and a sixth (mixed 4x400m relay) – and the mixed relay bronze at the World relays was significant too - so we can be confident.”

The rising tide in the sport swept a record crowd to the National Senior Championship finals at the end of June.

Budding stars of the future wanted a close glimpse of their Olympic-bound heroes.

“Success brings success, doesn't it?” McDaid said.

“One of the most exciting things now is that people are getting something out of my sport. It's so simple, but it is so entertaining and it has its drama.

“There's no doubt that strategy and planning has made it become a performance outcome environment.

“For me, it's so exciting being at this level of the sport I love at a successful time. There is nowhere else I would rather be.”