On the flight home from Shanghai last week, Fintan McCarthy was his usual self.

The World Rowing Championships were over, the Irish medal haul was hefty yet again, easy street was just a horizon away. With the season done, there was time now to down tools and give body and mind a well-earned rest.

Or maybe not.

“I actually find it quite hard,” McCarthy says, half-laughing at himself. “I’m always one to jump right into planning and deconstructing the season and seeing where we could have done a bit better. I’ve kind of just always been that way.

“So I was jumping around to all the coaches on the plane home and all the guys to see what the plans are for next year.”

McCarthy won his fourth and fifth world championship medals in Shanghai, taking gold in the mixed double sculls alongside Mags Cremen and bronze in the men’s double sculls alongside Philip Doyle.

It means that in his senior career in an Irish singlet, he has been to four world championships and two Olympics and brought home six gold medals and a bronze.

His place among the greats of Irish sport is written in stone.

And yet, as is the way, you’d have been forgiven for blinking and missing McCarthy’s gaiscaí - heroic triumph - last weekend altogether. You were watching the Ryder Cup. Or you were at the NFL game in Croke Park. Or you were buried deep under the sorrowful mysteries of Reuben Amorim’s United. Or your county championship was hitting the semi-final stage. Or the URC was back. Most likely, there was a combination of some or all of these to grab your attention.

But out in the world, Irish sport keeps rolling.