Kellie Harrington hoping rare defeat has 'put a fire' under her for Paris Olympics
Kellie Harrington of Ireland, right, looks on as Natalia Shadrina of Serbia is declared victorious in their Women's 60kg Lightweight semi-final bout during the 2024 European Boxing Championships. Photo by Nikola Krstic/Sportsfile
The strange scenes from the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Tuesday night, where the home fans all but reveled in a win for Manchester City that should ultimately deny Arsenal the Premier League title, raise again a question that runs through sport like a stick of rock.
Is there, despite everything instinct tells us, a good time to lose?
Kellie Harrington has never courted defeat. Her CV tells us as much. The reigning Olympic 60kg champion navigated three years undefeated, from her loss to Russia’s Nune Asatryan in February of 2021 to a first reversal in 33 bouts against Serbia’s Natalia Shadrina at last month’s European Championships.
The Dubliner has always been adamant that boxing does not define her. She said as much both before and after winning lightweight gold in Tokyo, but there is an understanding that maybe losing that unbeaten record has shed some of the outside expectation ahead of the Paris Games.
“I hope it has put a bit of a fire under my arse to get me going again. You don’t really learn anything from a win. I don’t watch many of my fights back that I won, I’ve probably seen the Olympic final twice and some clips other times.
“Other fights maybe once and maybe never but losses you will watch back and take parts out of them. I watched the last one back and I could say, ‘right, my jab isn’t active enough, I’m not moving side to side enough, I’m not teasing enough’.
“That’s where you learn, in a loss.” So, there was no blame game after the Shadrina loss that cost her another gold medal. When she finished pacing the corridors and reliving the nuts and bolts she knew that it wasn’t just technique or tactics. She knew she had tried to control the uncontrollables too.
All these years, all these successes, and still learning.
The 34-year qualified for the Olympics at last summer’s European Games but admits that the “focus hasn’t been there” at times since. This is changing. The process of shutting out the world and entering ‘selfish’ mode has begun.
This is how it has to be.
Harrington makes no attempt to glamorize the life of a boxer. It is, she admits, a “love-hate” relationship with the emphasis on the latter. The enjoyment comes only when the prep is done and the competition kicks in and she is two decades at this now.
That the sport can take a toll goes without saying but the dangers were made crystal clear again last week when Heather Hardy, who followed a long boxing career with a short MMA stint, stepped away from a fight due to repeated concussions and associated health issues.
“I didn’t hear that about Heather,” said Harrington. “I hope she’s alright. Yeah, of course I worry. And that would be part of why I wouldn’t go pro because I have been taking punches in the head for 20 years with 10-ounce gloves and a headguard.
“It is a lot different from professional boxing. And sometimes you come out after a really tough spar and could be a little bit slower than when you went in. So that’s partly why I didn’t want to go pro because I would worry about stuff like that.” Everyone has their own path.
One potential opponent in Paris is Amy Broadhurst, her former teammate with Ireland who has switched allegiance to Team GB and will attempt to qualify for the Games in the same 60kg class at the last qualifiers in Thailand later this month.
Broadhurst’s partner, Eoin Pluck, is a coach on the Irish high-performance team so, while Harrington has no issues with the Louth woman’s change of nationality, she has determined not to work with Pluck given the unusual circumstances.
“He won't be involved with me, which is a shame because he is a great coach,” explained the Dubliner on Wednesday afternoon, “but you can’t have that. Essentially, it is a spy in the camp so you can’t have that.”
Beatriz Ferreira, the Brazilian she beat in the 2020 Tokyo final, has taken the twin path that allows fighters to compete as pros and in the Olympics and Harrington sees a fighter that is even more fearsome now than the one dubbed ‘The Beast’ back then.
Whoever she faces, this will be an end, but only of sorts.
“That's it internationally but I'd like to box in the National Stadium again. I love boxing in the National Stadium, that's where everyone wants to box and there's no better way to give back than for your fellow athletes to see you step in the ring in the National Stadium.
“You're never too big for your boots and never too big for your roots.”
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