Olympic heartbreak led to World gold for Rob Heffernan

Five-time Olympian Rob Heffernan believes that the initial disappointment of missing out on a medal at the London Olympics spurred him on to becoming a world champion.

The Cork athlete finished an agonising fourth in the 50km walk at the 2012 games, recording the best-ever Irish Olympic result in the distance, and setting a new Irish record in the process.

Heffernan would eventually be awarded the bronze medal for that 2012 Olympics in London after Russian Sergey Kirdyapkin was stripped of his title for a doping violation.

While Heffernan was robbed of the chance to stand on an Olympic podium in front of a huge Irish crowd, he received his medal four years later and now believes that heartbreak in London helped him to win the world title the following year.

Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Heffernan said that the London Games remains the biggest highlight of his career.

"Every Olympics was very different but to compete in London, basically in front of a home crowd… it was taking back from the Brits! They provided an Olympic Games for us that we could go over to without the responsibility of running it," he joked.

"Winning a medal in front of Buckingham Palace, that was my big motivation. Going 'wouldn't it be great', an Irish man going over, racing in front of Buckingham Palace and waving to the Queen with an Olympic medal around your neck and Irish flags everywhere. The Mall was amazing.

"I finished fourth in the race and the time that I did that day would have won at every other Olympic Games, or it would have definitely medalled in all of them. I don’t know if it would have won at every other Olympic Games.

"The performance was brilliant but the Russian on the day, who probably set a 10K PB for his last 10K of a 50K – you