Aidan Walsh

then you should be able to enjoy it.

And that's my perspective on it.

Yeah, so I do athlete support with the boxing team in Boxing Ireland.

Yeah, so it's more like a support role in terms of like Sport Ireland provide the boxing team with a number of support services like physio and nutritionist and psychologist and...

all these things so my role is just sort of in the background as like a bridge or like a get like how do you bridge those support services how do you help athletes through transitions you know basically like if you define welfare for athletes it's about how can you help an athlete have a joyful experience in their time within that environment

And I think that's my role.

How can I help athletes?

Whether that be a chat in the gym or a coffee or, you know, helping them with, say, a college assignment or helping them get a job or goal set.

You know, it's a range of things.

But it's like, how can I help an individual who steps foot in Boxing Ireland to have a positive experience?

Because when you leave Boxing Ireland, which it's going to come to everybody, like it comes to us all,

I would love somebody to say I actually enjoyed my time there, I left with say some type of education, I left with some type of knowledge on how to manage myself outside of sport, like my identity is a lot stronger, you know I know who I am away from sport, all those things I would love to try and help young people who go into the sport and I think that's massive and I think again when we talk about expectations all those things are expected of you, you know to go in and you're just expected to transition into the program, you're just expected to go away win international tournaments,

You're expected to retire and live happily ever after.

But that's not the reality.

The reality is it's hard.

And be able to bridge those gaps between athletes and service providers and try and get the best out of the athlete, that's the role.

I just think it's massive and I just think because I've been in the situation myself, I know how important it is.

And I know, you know, even going back to listening, like Dr. Paul Gaffney, listening, like it's very rare a coach actually sits down and listens to you.

It's all, you know, it's like a dictatorship, you know, a lot of times coaching do this to you.

So I'm big on, how can I actually listen to athletes?