This much I know: Craig Doyle

I currently work too much but I’m scared to let anything go.

It’s seven days a week for the most part as I spend weekends in the UK and weekdays in RTE, with the odd advert shoot thrown in. But there are a lot of people struggling out there so I’m pretty lucky to be busy.

I’m really enjoying my new series but I won’t lie to you, live twice a week is tiring, specially on top of my other TV commitments with ITV, but the show has so much feel-good attached to it that it’s quite uplifting.

I trained as a news journalist in the UK, and the newsroom felt like a very natural place for me — all this other stuff happened by accident — although the sports production office has a newsroom feel to it, which is probably why I enjoy it so much. But I do often think about life as a small-scale farmer — I like to make my own sausages and the like. The world of charcuterie is calling me.

The best advice I ever received was from my brother. He told me to always be nice to receptionists: he once witnessed a BBC news editor, who was torn between two job applicants, ask the receptionist who was friendlier when they came in for their interviews — the nicest one got the job.

My first memory is of throwing wet toilet paper on the outside wall of Ryan’s Hotel in Sligo, it stuck like cement, my brother got blamed but I was too young to be implicated.

I have tried to read books on my iPad, but for fear of sounding like an old git, I just like the feel of a book — it doesn’t need a charger and my kids don’t nick it.

I’m pretty health conscious. I try to avoid too much fried food, and too much boozing. I love both, unfortunately, so I do suffer red wine and Guinness guilt regularly.

I train as much as I can. Running, some gym work and I’m into the static rower at the moment; it’s brutal but kind of cathartic. I just finished an 1,100 mile cycle, run, sail and row around Ireland and the UK for Sport Relief, along with Sonia O’Sullivan and Diarmuid Gavin amongst others. It was amazing. Sport is such a great way to bond with people. You see them at their best and worst when doing something really gruelling like that. I will return to triathlon next year, once the kids let me!

Bullying is destroying lives, and as much as people campaign against it, it never seems to go away. Cyber bullying is getting worse and the consequences more severe. The internet does have a dark side.

My greatest pleasure in life is my children, everything else I thought was important has kind of dissolved. I even listen to their music now — One Direction are not really so bad.

If I wasn’t presenting on TV, I would be in a radio newsroom producing programmes. It was my first and still one of my most enjoyable jobs.

The biggest challenge I’ve faced so far in my career was dealing with criticism when I first started appearing on television. It’s simply a part of the gig and as you get older you accept that.

I wasn’t a particularly confident child, I was shy — and I’m not always a very confident adult.

I think the internal combustion engine is the best invention ever. I just love the smell of an old two stroke.

So far life has taught me that it’s bloody short so you’d best get over yourself and get on with it.

Craig Doyle Live, RTÉ Two, Tuesday and Thursday at 10.30pm. They will be getting into Euro 2012 mania for the month of June, with post-match chat and guests following the opening game.