As I read through some of the race reports and reaction to Ciara Mageean's brilliant performance in the 1500m final at the World Championships in Budapest, one headline caught my eye.
'Heartbreak, but heroic’ and that really summed up the performance in going within a whisker of claiming just a seventh medal for Ireland at a World Championships.
It was both those things.
Faith Kipyegon added to her legacy with a third world title, followed closely by Diribe Welteji from Ethiopia. When Sifan Hassan passed Mageean coming off the last bend, there was still plenty of fight left in the Portaferry woman to hold off challenges from behind, but there was no catching the front three.
Sonia O’Sullivan knows what it is like to finish fourth at the World Championships final having done so 30 years ago in Stuttgart, while Eamonn Coghlan had two fourth-place finishes in the Olympics.
It’s a lonely place, but it’s also the edge of greatness.
Thirteen years ago she was the second best junior in the world and now she has finished fourth in World Championships final at senior level, and is in the shape of her life at 31 years of age.
There have been four European medals along the way, but along with the highs, she has endured some crushingly low experiences.
Those setbacks have never beaten her down and that vast canvas of experience fed into what we saw last night.
What we heard from her post-race is why the public have always warmed to Mageean; it was all human life in that interview zone afterwards.
It was a near-perfect race that she executed, but there were three women better than her, so her speed, endurance and concentration to keep her place, perfectly poised to move, just wasn't enough for a place on the podium, but she left absolutely everything on the track.
Breaking a national record in a world championship final is all we could ask for. It’s all she could ask for, except for that place on the podium.
She can take the many positives from the experience last night to the Paris Olympics next year and know that a medal is within reach for her.
Tonight sees our other big hope, Rhasidat Adeleke, hoping to become the first Irish sprinter to win a medal at the World Championships in the final of the women's 400m.
As much as the American collegiate (NCAA) champion should be regarded for a place on the podium, much like Mageean, there are three form athletes who have looked better than her in the first two rounds.
She will be up against World Championships silver medallist Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic – who won Adeleke's semi-final on Monday – Sada Williams, bronze medallist from last year’s World Championships and European silver medallist Natalia Kaczmarek of Poland.
They have looked in great shape in Budapest, but Adeleke has run faster than both Williams and Kaczmarek this season.
She will have the advantage of running from lane four, with her main rivals outside her. This will allow the Tallaght sprinter to assess what she has to do.
The 20-year-old will have to dig into that unquantifiable quality, that pure competitive steel that she undoubtedly has.
We saw that when she won the NCAA two months ago, which was a huge shock as she dug out a gold medal there.
Unquestionably she has a chance, but as she has a lot of races in her legs from an America competitive collegiate season that started back in January.
Elsewhere tonight, Sarah Lavin is in 100m hurdles semi-final this evening and she will almost certainly have to break Derval O’Rourke’s national record of 12.65 to make the final.
She posted a time of 12.69, just 0.02 outside her personal best in her heat and is a brilliant competitor at this level having reached a European and World Indoor final last year.
I wouldn’t put it past the Limerick sprinter to upset the odds and reach the final.
