Preparation is key at the top level of sport
ON the face of it swimming and Gaelic football could not be further apart. Absolute polar opposites. One is all about the individual pursuit of improving times and the other is about a group of men doing their utmost to impose their will on, and ultimately defeat, another group of men, writes Padraig Burns.
Yet, for Nicholas Quinn, it’s not that simple at all and he sees so many similarities between the two sports. Of course, the mechanics are different but otherwise they both tick the same boxes. He specifically references the mental preparation that top level sports people engage in.
“It’s all about the preparation and getting your body into a position where it can deliver what you want it to. In my case that might be about swimming a faster time or touching a wall ahead of someone else whereas for a footballer it’s about trying to be in a place where they can max out on their performance for the benefit of the team.
“There’s not that much difference at all in that. When I was in Rio I was talking to athletes from all the other sports and though our disciplines were different, we had an awful lot in common in the way we prepared so. It’s no different with Gaelic football either,” he said.
While swimming and Gaelic football might appear to be strange bedfellows, the same could not be said for soccer and the national sport. It’s not as common nowadays but the history of both sports is riddled with men who were accomplished at the two codes. Seamus Coleman is a good current example of someone who could be playing inter-county football had he not taken a chance with Sligo Rovers. Even today, when he’s getting the ball to take a throw in, Coleman always puts his foot under the ball in true GAA style.
There’s a Mayo man in the Showgrounds at the moment following much the same path as Coleman. Belmullet’s Gary Boylan was an accomplished exponent of both soccer and Gaelic. A former Mayo minor, he was signed with Sligo on their Under 19 panel when Mayo won the All-Ireland in 2013 and couldn’t join up with the county but he played the following year and had he not returned to the League of Ireland club he would most likely have been on the All-Ireland winning Under 21 team this year.
Like the Castlebar Olympic swimmer, he accepted that it was not possible to mix both sports at a high level so a decision had to be made. “I opted for the soccer because I don’t want to have any sporting regrets. I miss the GAA, especially not being able to play with the club in Belmullet, but I’m quite happy with where I am. People have asked me am I envious of the Mayo lads ahead of the final but I’m not one bit. I know what I’m at and that’s what’s important.
“It could have been different and there were approaches made last year to consider returning to the county scene but I had signed my contracts with Sligo and I wanted to see that out. Who knows what the future holds but for now and the near future I’m concentrating on soccer. I love getting up and going to training every day; it’s a great life,” he said.
Nicholas, too, was quite an accomplished Gaelic footballer and hurler with Castlebar Mitchels and he would have played with and against some of the players lining out next Sunday in Croke Park. “Yeah, I played both football and hurling and stuck with the hurling until I was about 16 because it fitted in better with the swimming schedule but eventually I had to concentrate on the swimming. In the football I was either at full-back or centre-field and I played centre-back at hurling. We would have had plenty of battles with the likes of Breaffy and Ballintubber growing up,” he recalled.
Twenty-year-old Boylan sees plenty of similarities between Gaelic football and soccer and the way that the top teams prepare. “In Sligo our training schedule is based around our games so if we have three games in seven days then training is obviously altered to suit that. It takes a while to get used to full-time training but you do adjust after a while. I remember when I signed up here I had come straight from the Mayo minors and I thought I was super fit but it still took me a while to get going here.”
He has seen at first hand how coaches in both sports prepare for matches. “Two days before each game we work on shape and our set up as well as doing all the video analysis. From talking to the GAA lads at home who are in the county set-up it’s the same there. It’s extremely professional in how they prepare and their fitness levels are superb. They work a lot on the tactical side of the game but the truth is that if they didn’t then the likes of Dublin would be too strong. Mayo are going to have to have plans for so many scenarios and all that will be done on the training ground. But they will be prepared.”
One aspect of the GAA that he feels would frustrate him if he returned to the sport is the delay between games. Recently, Sligo Rovers played five games in 20 days; by comparison, had Kerry beaten Dublin in the semi-final they would have played four games in four months. “We play 33 league games in the season as well as two cup competitions and you probably wouldn’t get close to that over two full seasons in the GAA playing and winning every competition. It’s the delay in between the games that frustrates the players and I would hear them on about it. A month since Mayo beat Tipperary is just too long. Too much time for thinking. That would drive me mad I’d say now if I had to go back to it,” he said.
Like most Mayo people thinking about the game on Sunday, Nicholas Quinn and Gary Boylan can’t get away from the fact that Dublin are a seriously quality outfit. Then they both put on their elite sportsperson's hat and they can see plenty of reasons why Mayo can win. “Firstly,” said Nicholas, “they are where they want to be. At the start of the season that was the goal so they have achieved that. Looking at it from the outside, I would see Mayo as being good enough to beat any team on any given day, and that includes Dublin. The trick though is to be in a position to give you the best possible chance of performing on the day.
“So what can Mayo do? Can they control the Dublin performance? No. Can they control their own performance? Yes they can. And that’s the key. I go back to my own sport here and I can do nothing about what the other seven guys do in the lanes beside me but I can control how I swim. I’d imagine that in the days leading up to the game players will be thinking about the season and thinking about what they did to get to the final. They will look back and ask themselves did they do all they could to prepare themselves properly and given that they are in the final, I’d say they will say yes they did.
“I know myself the night before I swam my first race in Rio I did that and concluded that I would not have changed a thing and it was reassuring. It will be the same with the Mayo lads. As I said already, they are where they want to be, there’s nowhere else in the world they would want to be next Sunday other than where they are. And it’s a huge event for them so they need to be able to control that performance. Get the first touch right, concentrate on the next ball, all that type of detail. And that’s what a good performance entails, the little stuff - take care of that and the big stuff follows and falls into place.”
Unfortunately for Nicholas, he’s back in college in Edinburgh and won’t be in Croke Park for the match. Qualifying for the World University Games and the World Championships occupies his thoughts at the moment. But he wouldn’t miss next Sunday for anything. “There’ll be loads of Mayo people out next Sunday and the pubs will be packed to the rafters. I wouldn’t miss it for anything. It’ll be a great day to be from Mayo.”
Gary Boylan also has other things on his mind ahead of the big day but he is hoping to make it to Croker. “We’re away to Bray Wanderers and we normally have Sunday off so hopefully I can get a ticket and stay in Dublin on Saturday night. I think we’ll win it by three or four points, seriously. We haven’t played anywhere near our potential and we’re in the final so if we play well and things go our way I can see us winning. By things going our way I mean the little details. A decision by the referee going our way, for example - that could be hugely important and it could change the game.”
In common with Nicholas, Gary's soccer commitments have precluded him from getting to games during the summer but if he can get his hands on a ticket he’ll be in Croke Park in a few days' time. Had things panned out differently he could have been in the team hotel on Saturday night. But he would not have it any other way.