Monday, April 25, 2011
THE dream factory off the South Circular Road, down the lane that runs alongside to the National Stadium, is not what you’d expect.
Your image of a top-class boxing gym maybe owes a little bit to the Rocky movies. Or, going back a bit further, a little bit to the odd Budd Schulberg novel. Or going back even further, maybe something to institutions like the famous Stillman’s Gym in New York, where the old-timer Johnny Dundee complained eloquently when it was put to those present that the windows — opaque, odorous — be opened ("Fresh air? That stuff is likely to kill us!").
An atmosphere you can reach out and touch, or at least inhale; a supporting cast of figures with a tangential relationship to the law; someone, somewhere, chewing the dead end of a cigar. Those lazy assumptions are not true of the training area for the Irish High Performance boxing team.
Light floods in from the windows set in the roof, and no dust clogs the lungs. The rings, set in a row, are clean and ready for action. Inspirational quotations are set in red and yellow squares around the walls.
"See those red and yellow panels?" says Billy Walsh. "They’re not McDonald’s colours. They’re deliberately picked, to create a dynamic atmosphere in those areas, next to the rings.
"It’s blue where the weights are — to help the boxers focus when they lift weights. It’s all done deliberately."
What would Johnny Dundee make of that?
The new culture, the old culture. Walsh, the High Performance Unit head coach, was one of those who helped to change things in Irish boxing. He and Gary Keegan and others were invited along to see the Russians prepare their boxers, until the Russians realised the Irish visitors were learning too much and promptly un-invited them.
"They have a systemic approach there," says Walsh.
"The coaches all go to college, they all do their four or five years, so they all work at the same system — and they can all do the fundamentals, which is something we can struggle with at times.
"Then there’s the sheer intensity at which they work, which was a big thing we took out of that, and something we worked at with our lads when we came back. But there’s also the sheer numbers they have at their disposal. They can throw 100 boxers at the wall and hope one or two stick. That’s not an option for us. We have to be specific, we have to be careful, so we have to manufacture lads to become champions."
That brings its own pressures. Lazy assumptions don’t just focus on local colour in the gym; from now until next summer you’ll be able to mark the appearance of newspaper articles thrown together about the boxing medals Irish boxers expect to bring home from London with some regularity.
They’re the source of the worry lines on Walsh’s forehead.
With a weary shake of the head he stresses nobody has qualified for the Olympics yet, which is Ireland’s biggest challenge.
"Forty-odd countries fighting for eight places, and don’t forget that that week, every four years, everything has to be right — and you have to have a bit of luck as well.
"If we can get the numbers to London we’re definitely in with a chance.
But we have to get there first, and we’re not looking past that.
"It’s sport. Why do underdogs win? Because it’s sport. We’re mindful of that, and as I remind the lads all the time, we’re just one punch away from a defeat."
The conversation winds on like smoke trailing out of a chimney. Walsh recalls tough evenings in tournaments held in a church basement on Cork’s northside, and it’s not just a war story; though those bouts took place before some of the boxers he now handles were even born, he can put names to those present, the likes of John Martin and Declan Mintern.
The brutal loneliness of the pro game is discussed, and the point is made simply about the team ethos of the High Performance Unit versus the solitary existence of a pro. He doesn’t over-egg that point, because he doesn’t need to.
On the way out, a large cardboard box near the door catches the eye. It’s been torn open, and new sports gear is inside, wrapped in cellophane packaging.
The new gear for the High Performance team? "Yes," says Walsh. "It came in today, the new tracksuits and singlets for the lads. Once they get their gear then they have to look after it. That’s the deal."
Lou Duva, the famous corner man, said of the men who occupied Stillman’s Gym in its considerable heyday: "When you talk of the trainers of yesteryear, they were masters — not like today. The trainers of yesteryear were much more dedicated to the sport."
True in Lou Duva’s circle, maybe. But not on the South Circular Road.
Our very last glimpse of Billy Walsh confirmed that below the olive short-sleeved shirt and tidy beige slacks, his boxing shoes, bright green with white stripes, were on his feet. Ready to go for when the lads came in.
Contact: michael.moynihan@examiner.ie; Twitter: MikeMoynihanEx
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