But try telling any athlete to smile about coming up one, single poxy place shy of their first senior international medal and you’ll be met, correctly, with a vacant, dead-eyed stare.

After McElhinney made his way to the bowels of the Atakoy Arena in Istanbul on Sunday evening, having finished just outside the medals in the European indoor men’s 3000m final, he held his face in his hands, his eyes a red, watery reservoir of hurt.

When the questions came, as they must, he looked at the ground, took a deep breath, and tried to verbalise what he felt. Tried and failed. On he quickly walked, the first man home who wasn’t holding his nation’s flag. The place that so many forget.

Minutes earlier, he stood in front of RTÉ’s David Gillick, and if there was one line he gave that summed up his race, it was this: “I timed it perfectly,” he said. “Or nearly perfectly.”

Nearly. In the months ahead this race will replay in his mind a thousand times, the question being whether he could have emptied the tank a little sooner, been a little closer, when the wheels started turning, when Jakob Ingebrigtsen began his slow suffocation of his rivals with a vicious, 3:40 last 1500m, bringing the Norwegian home to his second gold of the weekend in 7:40.32.

Spain’s Adel Mechaal won silver, with Serbia’s Elzan Bibic taking bronze in 7:44.03, McElhinney just behind in 7:44.72.

“I just can’t believe it, I’m so speechless for the first time in my life,” he said. “I can’t believe I came so close. I knew anyone who went with Jakob was going to die to a certain degree, and that was what happened. When I moved into fourth down the back straight, I thought it was there. It’s just a bit gutting.”

There will come a time he sees the race for what it was, a gigantic leap forward in his career, shredding the script of so many of his recent races when he’s had some weapons-grade blow-ups in the closing laps.

The time to see that wasn’t Sunday night in Istanbul, and it won’t be tomorrow or the day after, but having carved up the Irish distance-running record books throughout his underage days, McElhinney has now fully announced himself on the senior international stage. That matters, and it’s why this can’t be framed as a failure, by him or anyone else.

For Sarah Lavin, there was a similar sense of what-if after the final of the women’s 60m hurdles. The Limerick athlete produced a fine performance on Sunday morning, clocking 7.99 to advance to her third major championship final in the past year, but the 28-year-old was unable to reproduce the same effort when she got there, clocking 8.03 to finish sixth.

Tiny margins, of course, but at this level that separates the have-medals from the have-nots. Gold went to Finland’s Reetta Hurske in 7.79, with Lavin knowing the bronze medal time of 7.91 was within her grasp if she nailed every part of her race. But she didn’t, and no prizes for guessing where those crucial margins were lost: her start.

“I just couldn’t find it the last two days, the consistency of being in the right position and getting to that first hurdle with the other girls,” she said. “We just have to keep showing up. I’m getting better all the time.”

The specific work-on is clear, and Lavin’s coach Noelle Morrissey had a barrage of texts during the championships from those pointing out the obvious about her lacklustre start. “As if we haven’t been working on it for the past 21 years,” laughed Lavin.

Earlier in the night, the Irish women’s 4x400m relay team finished fifth in the final, clocking 3:32.61, with the Dutch taking gold in 3:25.66. Ireland were never truly going to be medallists here, barring a dropped baton elsewhere, but there were enough rookie mistakes in their racing that they’ll know they had the ability to be one place higher.

Sharlene Mawdsley shone brightest, putting the disappointment of missing the 400m final firmly behind her and unleashing a blazing split of 51.15, with Sophie Becker opening with 53.70, Cliodhna Manning clocking 54.39 on the third leg and Phil Healy bringing them home in 53.37.

“I made every mistake possible in that semi-final and the media is so quick to criticise you, and I felt the brunt of that,” said Mawdsley. “But I went out to give it everything I have, and I did myself justice.”

Phil Healy struck an optimistic tone after revealing she’s finally getting to the bottom of health issues that have plagued her since a bout of Covid-19 last year, and she will begin medication to treat them next week.

“There’s still ongoing tests but hopefully I do come back to my best,” said Healy. “In the winter I was so frustrated and I did contemplate stopping, I wasn’t enjoying it. It has been tough but I stuck with it and hopefully come outdoor season things will change.”