It was the race of her life.
Pulaski native, Deedra Irwin makes a historic finish in the women’s biathlon in Beijing, coming in 7th place in the 15 KM race, and now has the best individual result for U.S. biathlete in Olympic history.
“I just started laughing first I was like this is this is unreal. This is a dream and then like obviously like cry laughing because like, what the heck, I'd never gotten even a top 30 before on the World Cup so to get a top 10 is just amazing," Deedra says in a Zoom call shortly after her race Monday in Beijing.
Today in Beijing, the 29-year-old showed the world who she is. Crossing the Olympic finish line in 7th place. A feat no American man or woman is ever done in her sport.
It's just an honor to be in the same sentence, as the people who come before me as Susan Dunkley and Lowell Bailey, world champion medalists It’s just unreal to hear that in the same sentence that I’ve achieved such a similar result in my career,” Deedra adds.
Deedra’s parents, Rodney and Jennifer Irwin are still beaming with pride.
“It’s just one of those things. She went well above and beyond,” says her father, Rodney Irwin.
Both Jennifer and Rodney say they set their alarm clock for 3 am Monday morning, just before Deedra’s start time to watch her race. As soon as they saw her cross the finish line, Deedra made a video call to her mom and dad to celebrate.
“She was like, this is crazy, this is crazy. I didn’t expect this. She goes, I’m just as surprised as everyone else,” says Jennifer Irwin as she describes her video call with Deedra just after she finished her race on Monday.
“This is her best finish in biathlon I mean her finish before this. Outside of relay was 36 the place so to go from 36th to 7t that’s a big jump,” Jennifer adds, and wants to send a message to her daughter;
“We know what you can do now. You have shown us what you can do. So do it again, and again and again. But don’t hurt yourself,” she says.
As of this writing, Deedra has 4 more competitions in the Winter Games. The Women’s 7.5 KM Sprint on Feb 11th, the Women’s 10KM Pursuit on Feb 13th, The Women’s 4x6 KM Relay on Feb 16th, and the Women’s Mass Start on February 19th.
“It just goes to prove over and over again that anything can happen in the Olympics absolutely anything,” Deedra Irwin says.
