LIVING THE DREAM
For elite athletes, every hour of every day is influenced by the demands of their sport as they juggle packed training schedules
ABLIZZARD of numbers fills a GAA season. Revenue figures, team preparation costs, attendance averages, and the data that now governs how players train; a Championship story could be told through numbers. But one stands out: 31.
The number 31 was given a fresh airing during the spring-time standoff between the GAA and Gaelic Players Association (GPA) over expenses, but it should have a relevance way beyond that.
According to a 2018 report by the Economic and Social Research Institute, commissioned by the GAA and the GPA, inter-county players can spend up to 31 hours on their commitments to the game.
The report was based on a 2016 survey, and when it was released, it stoked a short-lived debate about the sustainability of demands placed on the modern player.
That discussion was newly illuminated by the recent row between the players’ body and Croke Park.
The potential negative impact on other aspects of their lives of young people devoting so much time to their sport was discussed in the ESRI’s detailed report.
It was big news because Gaelic games are big news.
But athletes involved in less high-profile pursuits would have recognised not only the commitment detailed and regularly highlighted during a championship season, but they would also know only too well the potential drawbacks resulting from that commitment.
Here, Sportsmail talks to three elite athletes, living very different lives, about their sport, the sacrifices involved, and why they do it.
Darragh Greene Age: 26
Sport: Swimming
Competed in the 100m and 200m breaststroke at Tokyo Olympics
DARRAGH GREENE isn’t long out of the pool on a midweek morning when he takes the call.
Free time isn’t extensive but he is decent with it. Ask him about a weekly routine and he reels it off quickly. He is well practised in the demands of elite swimming by now.
‘I train six days a week, and I’m in the pool two to three times a day,’ says the Longford man.
‘We get our plan every Sunday evening and I’m in on a Monday morning from 7am till 9.30am. Then I go from there to the gym, from 10am to 11.30am.
‘Then I’d drive home, get some food in for recovery, have a nap, get up and have something else to eat, and then I’d be gone again for the next session, the pool at 2pm.
‘I wouldn’t be out until 4.30pm or 5pm. Then it’s home, eat, and head to bed. It’s gym sessions on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, after that morning pool session.
‘The only morning I have off entirely is Thursday morning, but I train Thursday evening, so the only full day off is Sunday.’
On training hours alone, he is putting in at least seven hours a day.
‘It’s probably a bit more than that,’ he explains. ‘The physical swim is two, two and a half hours, but I’m getting out and have to hit my nutrition on time, and my recovery on time. So I have to get home, and get myself to sleep to be able to prep for the next session, which will be just as brutal as the last.
‘It’s a cycle from Monday to Sunday, so you take it in blocks: three weeks on of heavy training, then a week off, re-gen (regeneration) weeks we call them.
‘Then you’re building up for the competitions at the end of the season. At the elite level, everyone is full-time. You can’t really afford not to be. The best of the best aren’t in college, they’re not working parttime: they eat, sleep, and breathe this stuff we’re talking about.’
He made that choice, too, deferring his studies in UCD to commit to a high performance swimming culture overhauled by Jon Rudd, Swim Ireland’s performance director.
One of the most common questions he hears is about food, he says with a laugh. What does he have to sacrifice?
‘I can have a cup of tea or a bit of chocolate, because it’s going to get burned off the next morning,’ he says.
‘But it’s always a balance and you wouldn’t want to go too hard at it because you’ll feel the effects. I wouldn’t drink for months on end, and not until the end of the season.
‘It doesn’t help the body whatsoever. When you’re in a good routine and you set that off ever so slightly, you will feel the effects.’
Every decision he takes is with his sport in mind. There isn’t an hour in his week that is not influenced by that, and by the ambitions he still has to compete in the biggest competitions.
‘It’s been all worth it,’ he says without a second’s pause. ‘If you had told me five years ago I was going to be an Olympian,
I’d have been very, very surprised.
‘From where I’ve come from – I’m from Longford, the most landlocked county in the country, so to get a swimmer out of it, you wouldn’t have thought it!
‘There are times you think, “Is it all worth it?” It’s been 100 per cent all worth it. It’s such an intense sport, and it is cutthroat. If you’re only 99 per cent invested, it will be shown on the board straight away.’
Ann-Marie McGlynn Age: 42
Sport: Athletics
Will compete for Ireland in the marathon at the European Athletics Championships in August
AN UNSCHEDULED sporting commitment with one of her kids means AnnMarie McGlynn is multitasking. She sits in her car outside the children’s school, answering questions about her busy life while the kids sit quietly.
Four seconds, rather than 31 hours, is the amount of time that will register with those familiar with McGlynn’s running career.
She missed a place at last year’s Olympics by just that amount. She ran a brilliant race in the Cheshire marathon in April 2021, finishing in a time of 2hrs 29 mins 34 seconds – four seconds outside the qualifying standard required to go to Tokyo.
But it hasn’t dimmed her appetite for elite running.
‘I’m doing 90 miles a week, so that’s probably eight hours of running. Then you have two hours of strength and conditioning, and then your physio,’ she says. McGlynn is a native of Offaly, but she lives in Strabane, Co Tyrone, with her husband and two children.
‘Nothing is ever at hand, so you have to drive to physio,’ she continues. ‘I live in Tyrone, but my physio is in Letterkenny. Then I train in either Omagh or Derry, so that’s another 20 miles. ‘I don’t do much of my training in Strabane; I do my easy runs there, but I do my sessions in either Omagh or Derry. I’m all over the place.’
Her schedule gives her one day off every fortnight. Otherwise, the day is pulled between two poles: running and family.
‘It’s double (training) most days. It suits me and it’s a lot easier on my body.
‘I’ll probably do 10 miles easy in the morning, then four or five miles easy in the evening with strength and conditioning or some sports Pilates. On sessions days, it could be 13 miles between warm-up, session and cool-down. Then I might crosstrain in the evening.’
McGlynn was a very accomplished athlete in her teens and 20s, but walked away from the sport in her mid-20s. She started running again when dealing with the aftermath of a serious illness suffered by her son, Alfie, when he was only weeks old.
From then on, the passion returned, but so did the accomplishment.
It means she will represent her country in Munich this August, at the age of 42.
She thinks that the perspective offered by family and maturity is a positive influence on her running.
‘With a lot of athletes, athletics is their life and they forget about the bigger picture.
‘In my 20s, it was only athletics. That’s all I knew and that’s all I wanted. Then you soon realise there is life after it.
‘I took seven years out. I didn’t know if I was ever going to go back.
‘It wasn’t by injury, it was by choice. I’m glad I did find my way back, but now, it’s definitely not the be-all and end-all.
‘The kids come first. When I’m going away to a race, it’s getting them ready that’s probably the hardest part. When I’m on the plane, it’s “Aaaah!” It’s like a weekend away when I’m racing.’
Don’t doubt her desire to achieve on the road, though, to the point that the Olympic dream still flickers.
The next edition of the Games in Paris is just a little over two years away, with the schedule squeezed by the year’s delay in Tokyo.
‘It’s not that far away,’ she says with a smile. ‘The qualifying window will open sooner than you think. If I’m still fit and healthy, and running the way I’m running, I’m sure as hell going to go for it.
‘Unless something holds me back, I’ll definitely be looking to be on that line in Paris.’
Hugh Armstrong Age: 27
Sport: Athletics
Will compete for Ireland in the marathon at the European Athletics Championships
THIS IS what relaxation sounds like for an elite marathoner. Hugh Armstrong is running twice a day in recent weeks – as part of his recovery.
The Mayo man won the Wrexham Marathon three weeks ago, his time of 2hrs 14mins 04secs breaking the Welsh All-Comers record that had stood since 1963.
So as he eases his way back to more intense sessions, he is still running up to 15 hours a week.
‘Then you’re stretching and going to the gym, so it’s two, two and a half hours a day at least,’ he says.
He is a trainee accountant working for An Post in the GPO, and he will have exams to consider in the coming months, too.
Then there is the logistical challenge of finding the time to work full-time, study, and still train twice a day.
‘I live very near the Phoenix Park, so I just get up and run there most mornings before work,’ he says, making light of a 6.30am start.
‘It was nice when we were working remotely, and you could get back home shortly before starting work. But when you have to go into the office like today, you have to get up that bit earlier and have the run done and get yourself ready to go.’
As his training cranks up, so will the hours involved, and his running commitments will easily surpass 20 hours a week as the summer builds towards the European Championships.
His preparations in that regard will be held by training with the Dublin Track Club. This is the elite training group founded by Feidhlim Kelly, and which takes inspiration from the renowned Melbourne Track Club, run by Nic Bideau, husband of Sonia O’Sullivan.
‘When I train with Feidhlim’s group on a Tuesday and Thursday, we usually meet around 10am,’ says Armstrong.
‘Tuesday is usually a track session, and Thursday is tempo.
‘Work are very good, they give me flexibility and that allows me to go training.
‘Then on Saturday it’s out to somewhere like Howth for hills (hilltraining, a vital but brutal part of the training regime for elites).’
Armstrong has long been identified as a significant talent in Irish distance running.
He spent four years on scholarship at Providence College in Rhode Island, where the head coach is Ray Treacy, brother of marathon legend John.
Armstrong’s personal best for the marathon stands at 2hrs 12mins 26secs, which he set in Seville in 2020. It was less than a minute outside the Olympic qualifying standard and also good enough to be ranked in the top 10 Irish times for the distance.
However, if he had ambitions of building on that effort with Tokyo in mind, the pandemic struck to upend those plans.
‘It was only a couple of weeks after Seville that the world shut down, and it was a bit of a comedown after that,’ he recalls.
‘I had been building up and building up to that race in Seville, going for the Olympic time, and then I didn’t get the time, and then suddenly I had nothing else to aim for.
‘It was a little bit difficult with motivation but I managed to get back motivated knowing the Olympics was postponed for a year, thinking, “This is great, I have another shot at it in 2021”.
‘But then I got injured in January 2021 and it didn’t work out. I spent most of 2021 injured. This year it’s been good to be back and to be fit and healthy again.’
Paris is starting to creep across his thoughts, too, and he wonders what it would be like to devote himself to the sport full-time for a while.
As those deliberations continue, he has a packed schedule to address.
■ Ann-Marie McGlynn and Hugh Armstrong spoke as ambassadors for the Irish Life Dublin Marathon and Race Series. Entry is open for the Irish Life Dublin Race Series; 5 Mile, Fingal 10km, Frank Duffy 10-Mile and Half Marathon at IrishLifeDublinMarathon.ie. The Irish Life Dublin Marathon on Sunday, October 30 is sold out.