Wilf O'Reilly
Wilfred John O'Reilly MBE (born 22 August 1964 in Birmingham, Warwickshire - now West Midlands, England)[1] is a British former short track speed skater. He won two gold medals at the 1988 Winter Olympics when short track speed skating was held as a demonstration sport. He was also the 1991 Overall World Champion. He is now coach of the Netherlands short track team.
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| Full name | Wilfred John O'Reilly | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 22 August 1964 (age 56) Birmingham, Warwickshire, England | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Speed skating career
O'Reilly won two gold medals in the 500 metres and 1000 metres at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, but was denied full Olympic acclamation because short track speed skating was just a demonstration event that year. O'Reilly won the overall World Championship title in Sydney in 1991.
O'Reilly had a disastrous 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer where he crashed out of both the 500 metres and 1000 metres, protesting about being forced to race with a damaged blade.
He was honoured by TeamGB by being given the flag bearer role at the 1988 Olympics Opening Ceremony.[2]
Commentating
O'Reilly commentated alongside Hugh Porter for BBC Sport on Speed skating at the Winter Olympics in both 2010 in Vancouver and 2014 in Sochi, and partnered Simon Brotherton at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.
Honours
O'Reilly was awarded the MBE in 1997. He is currently a member of the ISU Short Track Speed Skating World Cup Management Commission.
References
- Evans, Hilary; Gjerde, Arild; Heijmans, Jeroen; Mallon, Bill; et al. "Wilf O'Reilly". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Archived from the original on 17 April 2020.
- "Eley wants a medal to go with his flagbearer honour". www.teamgb.com. Retrieved 9 October 2020.