{"id":288449,"date":"2026-02-09T06:30:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T06:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/288449\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T06:30:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T06:30:12","slug":"proud-to-represent-ireland-thomas-maloney-westgard-finishes-35th-in-mens-skiathlon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/288449\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Proud to represent Ireland&#8217; &#8211; Thomas Maloney Westg\u00e5rd finishes 35th in men&#8217;s skiathlon"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>TEAM IRELAND\u2019S THOMAS\u00a0Maloney\u00a0Westg\u00e5rd has finished in 35th place in the men\u2019s 10km + 10km skiathlon at the Winter Olympics in\u00a0Predazzo, Italy.<\/p>\n<p>Making his\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.the42.ie\/team-ireland-winter-olympics-squad-2026-6942026-Jan2026\/?jrnl_lg=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">third appearance<\/a> at the Winter Olympics, Maloney\u00a0Westg\u00e5rd crossed the line three minutes and 13 seconds behind gold medallist Johannes H\u00f8sflot Kl\u00e6bo of Norway, to take 35th place out of 73 competitors.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Silver went to\u00a0Mathis Desloges of France while Norway\u2019s\u00a0Martin L\u00f8wstr\u00f8m Nyenget took bronze.<\/p>\n<p>Maloney\u00a0Westg\u00e5rd, who was born in Norway and whose mother is from Galway, told RT\u00c9 Sport that it was a difficult race.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBrutal, that was a tough one. Soft conditions and quite icy and quite tricky [in the] downhills. It was a really challenging course, for sure. I was a bit anxious on the downhills.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\" xml:lang=\"en\">After the 10km+10Km skiathlon <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WestgardThomas?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">@WestgardThomas<\/a><br \/>finishes 35th of the 73 competitors who completed <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/TeamIreland?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#TeamIreland<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/MilanoCortina2026?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#MilanoCortina2026<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/rtesport?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#rtesport<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/tnUJY0oVHg\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/tnUJY0oVHg<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 RT\u00c9 Sport (@RTEsport) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RTEsport\/status\/2020475026433077285?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">February 8, 2026<\/a> <\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy plan was to stick in the front for as long as I could but the pace was ridiculous, full out right from the start. No time for rest, the cramps were coming after the race. It was so tough just like it should be in the Olympics. I put everything out there and I can\u2019t really ask for more.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Maloney\u00a0Westg\u00e5rd, who went into the Games targeting a finishing place between 30th and 40th, says he is proud to represent Ireland and is looking forward to his other events at the Winter Olympics.<\/p>\n<p>He will return on Friday, 13 February for the 10km Freestyle cross-country and again on Saturday, 21 February for the\u00a050km Classic cross-country.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt has been challenging for me this season. I struggled a bit with over-reaching and had no clue as to what shape I\u2019d be in coming to the Olympics. I\u2019ve has better races for sure but I\u2019m really happy, really proud to represent Ireland. I can\u2019t really ask for more and I just look forward to the upcoming races. \u201c<\/p>\n<p>                <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TEAM IRELAND\u2019S THOMAS\u00a0Maloney\u00a0Westg\u00e5rd has finished in 35th place in the men\u2019s 10km + 10km skiathlon at the Winter&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288450,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,138376,112,138007,23196],"class_list":{"0":"post-288449","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-skiathlon","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-thomas-maloney-westgard","13":"tag-winter-olympics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}