Deirdre Gogarty talks boxing, world titles and books

Meeting world champion boxer Deirdre Gogarty when she visited Ireland in October was a real pleasure. They say never meet your heroes but sometimes it's turns out just fine.

I posted the newspaper article I wrote on her here, and finally getting around to uploading the radio interview today. Enjoy!
Deirdre Gogarty’s book ‘My Call to the Ring’ is available online from Amazon.com

World Champion boxer Deirdre Gogarty visits Ireland

The walls of St Saviour’s Boxing Gym in Dublin are covered with photos of tough-looking men, gloved-up and ready to fight. But next to Muhammed Ali, there’s a photo of Deirdre Gogarty with a World Title belt around her waist. 

World Champion 1997 Irish Boxer Deirdre Gogarty (this pic from 1994)

Deirdre Gogarty won that belt in 1997 after ten years of training in Ireland and America. Women’s boxing was illegal in Ireland then so she’d moved to Louisiana

“I started in Saviour’s really, I was young then and thought no-one in the world could beat me. It was an instinct in me to fight, it was just something I had to do,” she says, standing next to the ring.

Now a boxing coach and graphic artist in Louisiana, I met her in October when she came to Ireland to launch her autobiography. She also made time for a training session with Olympic champion Katie Taylor. 

Gogarty and Taylor go back a long way. When Gogarty won her Women’s International Federation of Boxing title in New Orleans, 11-year-old Taylor wrote to her.

“I kept a letter she sent congratulating me on wining the world title. And at the bottom she said maybe one they will let us box at the Olympics,” Gogarty says.

“It is brilliant to see her now. I’m living a little bit through her, I would have wanted everything she did and it’s just great she has the chance now.”

But she says thinking any amateur boxer can make an easy transition to professional fighting is a mistake. Gogarty herself went straight into the pro game but she says for anyone with a choice that would be “madness”.

Aside from the obvious differences of no head-gear and smaller gloves, the Drogheda woman says the fights are tougher.

“You are paid so you are expected to handle a lot more punishment and fouls. You get fouled more – head-butts, low blows and kidney punches. You are more prone to getting cut too. But in amateur the emphasis is on safety,” she says.

And you’re alone, she says, there is no support like the High Performance Team gives to amateur boxers in Ireland. She refers to professional boxing promoters as “sharks”. In contrast amateur boxers compete in highly-regulated tournaments. 

One of Gogarty’s most famous fights was on the undercard for Mike Tyson Vs Frank Bruno in 1996. Her opponent’s battered face put women’s boxing on the map for millions of viewers. 

But she hopes people will realise the huge differences between professional and amateur scenes.

She says: “Boxing is tough at any level. But everyone should absolutely try amateur boxing. Knowing you are fighting and being able to prepare for that is a life experience that will stand to you.”

Gogarty hopes the so-called ‘Katie Taylor” effect will bring girls into boxing gyms. But she’s unsure how many could ever compete at Olympic level.

“There are not very many people, boys or girls, who go into competition. It takes a special person to climb into that ring. It takes a lot of courage. This is not a sport for everybody,” she says.

Deirdre Gogarty’s book ‘My Call to the Ring’ is available online from Amazon.com 

(and in Easons if you're in Ireland!) 

A version of this story first appeared in the Irish Independent's FIT magazine. 

Can you help "With this Ring" boxing film?

This weekend women's amateur boxing finally gets its dues - and there is something you can do to help spread the story of these pioneers. 

As I wrote here, it's been 108 years since boxing made its debut as a demonstration sport at the St Louis Games but the women have finally arrived. Canadian film-makers Ameesha Joshi and Anna Sarkissian have followed three Indian fighters since 2006, charting their attempts first to fight and then to make London2012.

Mary Kom pic IBN LIve

You will may recognise one of them - Mary Kom, with her five World Titles at 46kgs. But the other two are no laggards either, Chhoto Loura has two bronze medals (world) at 50kgs and Sarita Devi is a five-time Asian champion at 51kgs.

It's been a difficult journey as the Olympic categories didn't really fit with their natural fighting weights - Kom comes to London in the 51kgs category. And Devi boxed at 60gs at the World Championships in May in a qualifying attempt which ultimately failed.

And no less difficult for the film-makers. We've been in touch since I first posted about them in July 2010, Ameesha sent me the latest on their funding efforts yesterday:

"Our story ends at the Olympics where Mary Kom will be competing and could be the first Indian woman ever to win a gold medal.  So it's exciting times.  Co-director/Cinematographer Anna Sarkissian is in Liverpool at the moment with Mary Kom for her final days of training.

We launched an online campaign to help raise money to pay for post-production so we can get this completed and out there.

We have 22 more days to raise $17,500 and could use all the help we could get.  Our fundraising campaign is hosted by Indiegogo, the crowdfunding site.

We are also huge fans of Katie Taylor, have had the pleasure of watching her compete since 2006. After seeing her at the Worlds in Qinhuangdao, I think they should just give her the gold, she was light years ahead of her competition! "

I love the Katie Taylor mention, very gracious of you Ameesha! So if you're gutted not to be in London and want to see more women's boxing on the screen, go to Indiegogo  It's worth a look even just for the sponsor-package titles.


Why have they done this?

Ameesha Joshi: "India has some of the best women boxers in the world. They have risen to the top from very humble circumstances. Although I grew up in Canada, my parents emigrated from India and I'm aware of the cultural expectations and could imagine some of the criticism these woman would've faced. We knew we had found some extraordinary trailblazers.”

Anna Sarkissian: "They are so unique, and yet unassuming. For a long time, they didn’t really understand why we were interested in filming them. Despite a few perks, they live tough lives, and train in difficult conditions to pursue a sport that many might consider laughable. I have profound respect for the amount of discipline, physical and mental strength that boxing requires and am in awe of their dedication.”

They can be contacted directly through their website: With This Ring

Arthritis and adventure racing

Hip replacements and arthritis are things we usually associate with older people, people in their 60s maybe. But not always. American adventure racer Robyn Benincasa was diagnosed with osteoarthritis at 41. 

Robyn from Project Athena Foundation

Robyn says on her website she was taking part in the World Championships in 2007 when it all came to a head. "I was in so much pain that I took one final step and fell to the ground on the fifth day of the race, the day that my team was climbing the biggest peak in the country, Ben Nevis. My teammates took all of my gear and put me on a tow line. Often during the last thirty-six hours of that race, I had to physically pick up my leg and move it forward because it would no longer respond to signals from my brain." 

I'm sure lots of you reading have felt as if you were throwing a leg up the mountain from time to time but this was something else. With 15 years of adventure racing  - if you don't know, they're the people that run, bike, kayak or climb for days over mountains, through rivers or caves and well over whatever is in the way - behind her Robyn was not someone you'd expect to be told both hips were disintegrating.

And this is where the story moves behind the usual athlete-gets-injured and overcomes. Obviously osteoarthritis isn't a death knell but it can be next to that for many people. 

After two gruesome sounding operations involving dislocation of a leg by the surgeon, Robyn tried to find, well, find the meaning in the mess. First she started with two friends, who'd had rheumatoid arthritis and breast cancer, organising an adventure race-team. And from there, it grew into a foundation Project Athena that works with women who've been through disease and want to start living again. 

The woman who sent me on the link (thank you Sandy) says it's an "incredible story". We all think when we're sick we will never forget how frustrating it is but usually once we get better, that's it. Illness packed in a box never to be thought of again. But Robyn Benincasa managed to hold onto that even while she started racing again - enough that she is able to get other women on their feet again. 

I had to smile at the final line on her page from her book Team Works: "I guess the moral of the story is that none of this life changing and life affirming stuff would have happened had there been more cartilage in the world." 

Do you know anyone else living with a disease usually associated with older people?