The Most Famous

Athletes from Ireland

This page contains a list of the greatest Irish Athletes. The pantheon dataset contains 6,025 Athletes, 60 of which were born in Ireland. This makes Ireland the birth place of the 47th most number of Athletes behind Slovakia and Lithuania.

Top 10 Athletes

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary Irish Athletes of all time. This list of famous Irish Athletes is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography's online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of Irish Athletes.

People by Birth Decade

Browse notable Irish Athletes grouped by birth decade. Each decade shows the top 10 by HPI; expand to see everyone.

Overlapping Lives

Which Athletes were alive at the same time? This visualization shows the lifespans of the 13 most globally memorable Athletes since 1700.

Top 10 Athletes

John Flanagan

Patrick Ryan

Pat McDonald

Martin Sheridan

Tim Ahearne

Matt McGrath

Pat O'Callaghan

William Carr

Tom Kiely

Patrick Leahy

People by Birth Decade

2000s(1)

1990s(24)

1980s(6)

1970s(7)

1960s(2)

1950s(1)

1930s(1)

1900s(1)

1880s(3)

1870s(7)

1860s(2)

1780s(1)

Unknown(4)

Overlapping Lives