LESS than 30 seconds into Grainne Walsh’s first fight at the final World Olympic qualifier, Damian Kennedy knew she was going to Paris.
High performance coaches are not given to premonitions or rash judgements in the heat of the moment. They deal in a world of data and performance analysis, where the next day, not even the next fight, is all that ever matters.
But the Toome man had worked with Walsh at close quarters in the eight weeks building towards Bangkok. He was there in Milan, standing stunned on the ring apron as Agneta Rygielska celebrated sealing her Olympic spot courtesy of a head-scratching split decision win over the Offaly woman.
Such a huge setback would have floored most.
Then there was the worry about who was waiting at home, with world champions Amy Broadhurst and Lisa O’Rourke suddenly back in the conversation for the last qualifier.
After a few days of “mourning”, however, Walsh returned more determined than ever. The high performance unit decided there would be no assessment at 66kg – just the vote of confidence Walsh needed as the road in front began to narrow.
From the second she stepped through the ropes in Bangkok for the first of four fights that would complete the realisation of a long-held dream, Walsh was not going to be denied.
During the training camp in Hua Hin, Kennedy had warned Walsh not to allow her opponent to tie her up inside when she broke close distance. North Korea’s Hwang Hyo-Sun attempted just that when Walsh went on the offensive during the opening seconds, only to be met with the full force of the 29-year-old’s determination to right the wrong of Milan.
“I wanted to see her getting her hands out of there,” said Kennedy, “but Grainne was trying to pull her hands out that quick she nearly took her hands out of the gloves.
“That’s when you know…”
One after another fell until, with a comprehensive, Olympic spot securing destruction of Vietnam’s Hoang Ngoc Mai, the job was complete; better late than never.
“I let a roar out of me at the final bell,” smiles Walsh, “then I went over to the corner to get my gloves off and I was like ‘did I definitely win?’
“The moments you dream about, when they happen, they’re just moments and it comes so quick. You would love to freeze time and bottle up that feeling, just go back to it, dip in and out of it whenever you’re having a bad day.
“When I look back at the pictures… you nearly pinch yourself that it’s you.”
The heartache suffered in Milan made it all the more sweet in the end; the extra fights, those extra spars so late in the cycle leaving her sharp as a tack with the opening session of the Olympic boxing competition just 11 days away.
Yet overcoming adversity, and finding ways to somehow bounce back, have been the story of the latter part of Grainne Walsh’s boxing career.
During the early days, she had it “too easy”. With a shallow pool at around welterweight at domestic level, she was regularly selected for international tournaments without being too far removed from her comfort zone, while a bronze medal at the 2019 European Games brought funding and, with that, sponsors.
Eloquent and articulate, determined and dedicated, Walsh is exactly the kind of athlete brands want to be associated with. Things couldn’t have been going much better.
“My ego loved all that – my ego loved reading up about myself online and all of that stuff that’s here today, gone tomorrow.
“Then I got injured and it was all almost gone.”
That was during the qualifying period for Tokyo 2020, with four operations on her right thumb saw Walsh box just three times in the next three years.
At times she considered walking away, but family and friends would always talk her around. The rest, though, was up to her. Walsh learned to write with her left hand because the right spent so much time out of action, and repeatedly found the strength to drag her boxing career back from the brink.
A breakthrough Irish final win over Broadhurst in January 2023 should have heralded a new beginning – but instead it brought her back to the house of pain when the Dundalk woman was handed the first shot at securing qualification 2024 at the European Games.
Walsh was convinced Broadhurst would do it. Her Olympic dream in the hands of someone else, she felt utterly helpless – until Broadhurst lost out to future GB team-mate Rosie Eccles in the quarter-finals, opening the door just enough to let the light in once more.
A sign? Meant to be? Walsh has no doubt.
“I thought that was the end of the road. My parents didn’t, they bought their tickets and all for Paris, that’s how much they believed in me… I was nearly like ‘oh, guys, don’t buy them, you’re wasting your money’.
“Everything that happened to me had to happen exactly as it did. I thought I was the most unfortunate person in the world, but it was just a way of showing me how much I wanted it.
“Even when I compare it to the whole Tokyo Olympics, I missed out on qualification there because of injury. Looking back, I was not ready to become an Olympian at that point. I thought I was because everyone was on the same journey but, when I compare it to how I felt for this Olympic cycle, I didn’t have a clue what it meant to be an Olympian.
“I hadn’t gone through enough, I hadn’t faced enough adversity. I’m just so proud of myself above everything else, because I pulled myself out of many a dark hole - as well as everyone. Every athlete that gets to the Olympics has gone through a million challenges.
“All those setbacks were designed to actually set me up for this moment, and I genuinely believe that this is all written in the stars for me.”
Those words are easy to say when you reach this stage, sitting at the mouth of an Olympic Games.
But let’s rewind to Milan, and the Rygielska defeat. Photos from the seconds after capture the depth of Walsh’s disgust, compared with her Polish opponent’s delight. Eyes glazed, face drawn, the Tullamore woman looks lost.
She knew she had won, but had no choice other than to accept defeat. It proved a defining moment on her road to Paris.
“I was just saying ‘how many more lessons do I need?’
“Like, I understand now how to come back from setbacks and stuff, but how many do I need? How many lessons am I actually being dished out here?
“But then, I’d never been in the situation of fighting for an Olympic qualification place and, at the same time, I kind of had my eyes on ‘oh my God, if I win tomorrow, I get to go to the Olympics’. I was almost fascinated with the outcome before I’d ever gone through the process.
“People were always saying to me to be careful of that, but it’s so hard not to, and I think that’s probably why I didn’t perform my best. Even though I should have qualified, I didn’t perform to my best that day. You have to be extremely honest with yourself.
“After Milan, I didn’t know what side of me was up or down, and I didn’t know how to get through it all. I remember lying in bed thinking ‘I’m in a worse position now than I was a month ago’ because of the uncertainty of whether I would get the opportunity again; almost having my hands on the ticket and then going like ‘how am I going to do this again? What if I never get to call myself an Olympian because of that decision?’
“Like, all I ever wanted was to go to a qualifier to see and get the answer to ‘was I good enough to qualify for an Olympics?’
“Because I always believed I had the ability to do it, but whether I deliver when the time came, or whether I got the opportunities... now I’ve qualified and that’s only the start of it. I have great momentum now, and I’m 100 per cent not going to Paris just to make up the numbers.”
