I helped Carruth win gold, then was ditched
Documentary tells the story of the Cuban trainer who defected here
HE helped coach Michael Carruth to Olympic gold in 1992 – but Cuban trainer Nicolás Cruz Hernandez ended up sweeping floors and living in a small room at the back of a gym near the National Stadium.
A new RTÉ Radio One documentary aired this weekend reveals how the Irish Amateur Boxing Association arranged for the defection of the top Cuban boxing coach after he helped win Ireland medals in Barcelona in 1992.
But Cruz Hernandez was soon dropped from a temporary coaching role for the Atlanta Games in 1996, ending his Olympic dreams.
He says he still ‘loves Ireland’ despite experiencing racist abuse here and feeling ‘let down’ by the
IABA. The Cuban became a national hero after coaching the men’s Irish national team to its best Olympics yet in 1992, on loan from Cuba.
Michael Carruth and Wayne McCullough faced Cubans in their finals – Carruth won gold, McCullough landing silver. ‘It was unbelievable. It took me half an hour to get down a street,’ Cruz Hernandez recalls. He returned to Cuba and dreamt of coaching Irish boxers in the 1996 Games. But Cuban boxing authorities refused permission.
Following contact from the IABA, Cruz seized an opportunity to defect while at a seminar in Puerto Rico. ‘My son Nicolás was a year old. My daughter was seven... Just before I left I said if I am not back I am going to Puerto Rico.’ In Puerto Rico he called the IABA. ‘They said we need you here to prepare our team for the 96 Olympics. We have a prepaid ticket and a visa.’ But he was shocked to discover that no official role or regular salary was waiting for him when he moved to Ireland. He threw himself into training boxers for the 1996 Games in Atlanta anyway but then came a bombshell. The Cubans had written to the IABA telling them not to send him – and the association complied with their demands. ‘I felt that I was let down,’ says Cruz Hernandez. ‘I knew I couldn’t go back with the Cubans to get the position I had. That I was a traitor.’
With little funding for Irish boxing, Cruz Hernandez ended up with no regular income living in a room at the back of a gym near the National Stadium with a single bed donated by a boxing friend. This was a dark period when he couldn’t see his family or attend his father’s funeral as defection meant being unable to enter Cuba for five years. He recalls: ‘I couldn’t see light at end of tunnel. I was waking at 3am in tears.’ He considered suicide but a chance encounter with a monk at the stadium gym led to him embracing Buddhism.
In 2000, the IABA finally offered him a job on £15,000 a year. Issues of pay, control and rumoured clashes of personality were behind Cruz’s resignation in 2001 as head Irish coach – to teach yoga
‘I’m happy I came here because of boxing’
and boxercise in Midlands Prison.
The documentary catches up with him from 2017 when mental health issues resurfaced and he agreed to seek professional help. He would go on a trip to Cuba where there was an emotional reunion with his 98-year-old grandmother and a first meeting with his granddaughter.
Cruz Hernandez told the Irish Mail On Sunday he is ‘not bitter’. He says: ‘I love this country. I’m happy I came here because of boxing.’
Documentary On One: Nicolás Cruz Hernandez – Still Fighting, repeats tonight on RTÉ Radio 1 at 7pm.