Irish Olympian has medal taken off him over "chronic issue"

Daire Lynch and Phillip Doyle took home the bronze in the double sculls, becoming one of three bronze medalists at Ireland’s most successful Olympics ever — alongside Mona McSharry and Daniel Wiffen — but have seen the conditions of their medals deteriorate quickly.

Daire and Philip showed off Philip’s bronze medal on "Ireland AM" on Tuesday, but Daire revealed that his was taken off him by the IOC to see what is wrong with the metal in the medals, while the top layer of Philip’s medal had deteriorated and "gone wrecked."

"Mine is gone wrecked. It’s nearly gone the next layer down,"Philip explained, with Daire adding "I wanted to keep mine but they wanted to take it away for research. They want to see what is wrong with the medals."

"Some of the gold [deteriorates] but not too many, but the bronze seems to be a chronic issue"’ Philip added, with the pair explaining the day of the final for their race — with Philip admitting that while the guys were in a good mood the night before their final, the morning of was a different story.

"The night before was perfect and I felt great and went to sleep the whole way," Philip said.

"We do a bit of training together on the morning of the race to get the body warmed up and I said I felt good and the mind felt good, and then I tried to eat the breakfast and it was like eating sick… I was looking across to [Daire] and I was taking little bites and he was like 'I can’t eat this.' That was real nerves."

Daire and Philip came in bronze in the double sculls after Romania and the Netherlands, with Ireland winning three bronzes alongside swimmers Daniel Wiffen and Mona McSharry.

 Daniel picked up an incredible gold medal and Olympic record in the 1500m freestyle, with boxer Kellie Harrington, rowers Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy, and gymnast Rhys McClenaghan bringing the gold medal tally to four, and total medal number to seven — the country’s most successful Olympic Games ever.

Watch  Philip Doyle and Daire Lynch on "Ireland AM":

* This article was originally published on Extra.ie.