Alex Wright: Walking with a renewed purpose on the road to Tokyo

Its been an eventful 12 months for racewalker Alex Wright with the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics. The arrival of baby Holly has changed his focus and perspective - but all for the better. 

MAN IN A HURRY: Alex Wright competing in the Irish Life Health National 20k Walks Championships in Raheny, last year. Wright competes in his second Olympic Games in Tokyo later this summer. Picture: Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile

For all Alex Wright’s adult life, everything revolved around his racewalking. Not only family but even having a family. Just as he habitually sits down with his sport psychologist Canice Kennedy before every competition to draw up a race plan, he and his wife Lauren conscientiously decided that they’d have a baby after the Tokyo Olympics, preferably as soon as possible after the Olympics. And so in early March of 2020, little Holly was conceived.

She would be a post-Olympic baby, help give him a post-Olympic focus. Something or someone that anytime earlier would have been a distraction.