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Sport for Business
Sport for Business
Unscripted Courage In Irish Sport
Let us know what’s on your mind
Some stories only land when the mic is live and the notes are gone. We sat down for a raw, unscripted session at the Active Disability Ireland Annual Conference to hear what sport really means when life bends, breaks, and rebuilds. Rob opens with honesty about living with MS, then we pass the floor to two remarkable guests whose journeys reframe resilience and inclusion in Irish sport.
First up, Melanie shares how a spinal injury closed one chapter and opened another with wheelchair rugby league. She walks us through the sport’s pace and physicality—five-a-side, tags for tackles, a real rugby ball—and the practical hurdles, from expensive sports chairs to maintenance that never ends. Training with Wigan sharpened her game, while Ireland’s programme surged under new coaching: back-to-back Celtic Cups, a home win in Galway, a learning tour to France, and a world ranking that now points to Australia next November. It’s a story of momentum built on coaching, kit, and community.
Then Kerry takes us into the quiet storm of elite archery. She missed Rio by a breath, broke her leg before Tokyo, and still kept going as the pandemic stretched the cycle to seven years. The call to fly came just six weeks out. She talks about the loneliness of empty stadiums and how she built her own support by cheering for solo athletes—who returned the favour the next day. Her insights on focus are razor-sharp: reset every arrow, refuse autopilot, breathe, visualise, begin again. And she explains why retiring now is the bravest move—balancing personal wellbeing with the need for broader systems that don’t rely on one person to keep a sport visible.
Across both stories, a clear message emerges: real inclusion is infrastructure plus empathy. Lower barriers to equipment. Fund coaching and competition. Create pathways that last longer than any single athlete’s career. If you care about Irish sport, high performance, or the human engine that powers both, you’ll find plenty to take with you.
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Just being here and putting our little nation on the map, it's just you know this is the stuff of of dreams on the turn for your line.
SPEAKER_06:It's good, it's good, Jonathan, and John Christmas.
SPEAKER_04:Hello and welcome to the Sport for Business Daily Podcast. It is Thursday, December the 4th. My name is Rob Harners, I'm your host, and in today's episode, we look back on a day of inclusion and inspiration at the Active Disability Island Annual Conference for 2024, which took place at the Johnstown House State in Enfield. And one of the elements that we introduced this year was a an unscripted series of conversations where I was joined on stage by three individuals, all from within the disability support space, none of whom I knew who they were going to be, which was a take on the Tommy Cannon show on RT. Um have a listen in and see what you think. The first two of the conversations are featured on today's uh daily podcast, and we will feature the third of them and a wrap up on it in the show um over the coming days as well. It was a really, really great day. There's plenty of content on sportforbusiness.com outlining some of the conversations which took place throughout the day. The Sport for Business Daily is an audio blast of the content which we produce every day on sportforbusiness.com. If you want to find out more, please do visit us at the website or sign up, subscribe, comment, and share wherever you get your podcasts from.
SPEAKER_05:So this segment is called Unscripted Conversations. And joining us as our host today for that part of the conversation.
SPEAKER_07:Oh my god, everybody called it.
SPEAKER_05:Uh so we are gonna have some unscripted conversations, just like it's unscripted right there. Um versations. I'm going to bring a man who is normally so well prepared. In fact, he's even more well prepared than I am. And I'm trying to be so prepared. So find his comfort zone. And today, I'm delighted to have Rob Hartner, the CEO of Sports for Business, join us as our host for this session, which is kindly sponsored by High R and Sofa. I'm not pretty sure how this is going to work. I'm a drum like Fred Coca-Cola, and you're going to have some conversations with three individuals who, well, we're not sure if they know them or not.
SPEAKER_03:I haven't got a clue who they are. I haven't been able to do any preparation, which does lift me outside of my comfort zone. Normally it's quite happy when I get up onto the wife ago. And nobody has got one of the things, which obviously two people are going to invite a nice happy thought about. Um normally when I get up onto the stage, like my regular set of resting heart rates would be around just 58, 59, 60. When I get upstairs, it goes down to about 54 or 55, which is kind of freaking, but pretty good. I've just looked at them before I get up here to 98.
SPEAKER_05:I would share the secret. I'm not sure if anybody heard my watch my mouth during the first panel today, but I kept getting the abnormal heart freak.
SPEAKER_03:It's because it's because we love the wall so much that we don't want to disappoint you. And that's what makes us nervous about it.
SPEAKER_05:So so have you done any prep at all? Like, how have you signed yourself up for this? Because this is totally out of your comfort zone.
SPEAKER_03:I the only prep I gave was that you were going to introduce me and Shin Shen. Other than that, it's all about the three wonderful guests. Well, I hope they've been wonderful, I expect them to be wonderful. Uh, and it's all about them. So it's um, yeah, I mean I'm I'm not me up there on today, I am everybody. I am in theory stepping into a world where I'm going to be introduced to somebody with a disability for the first time. How do I cope with that? How do you how does the person want me to cope with that? How do they explain themselves? And in theory, it should hopefully all work.
SPEAKER_05:Well, this was just a little similar to the green room with the chat before we go on stage. So, ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for the unscripted conversations host, Mr.
SPEAKER_03:Response already, so I'm I'm definitely coming into my happiness. Um for those who can't see me, I am 179 centimetres tall. I know that because my daughter is 180 and she continually tells me uh I'm incredibly dead and good looking. Um no need to laugh. Um, and for all of you who can't see me, uh the thing that is uh that I have a human disability, uh, which is that I set up sports business 48 years ago, and two years in I was diagnosed with multiple cirrhosis. So it is something which scared the life out of me at the beginning. But if I want to do very good medical care, I take very good drugs, which means that I can cope with it and I can manage it and I can keep my life going as uh, you know, as almost without any impact on it whatsoever. Um but that's not to say that it is a disability which is the same as many of you have out there, and so the challenges I face, I've had a vague small understanding of it. Um, but other than that, uh no, that's so that's me. Uh and remember the devon air and good-looking conclusion when you're uh when you're when you're treating the whole gram as Joanne in the cool way uh talks about it. So um over to you then, Joanna Fred.
SPEAKER_05:Okay. So, Ron, your very first guest for unscripted conversations is Melanie Griffith.
SPEAKER_07:Woo!
SPEAKER_03:Hi Melanie, nothing's meeting you. Uh I'm old enough to remember that there was an actress called Melanie Griffith.
SPEAKER_01:That's a verb was it's not being what's under your symbol.
SPEAKER_03:I really shouldn't have set myself up for that. Um I've got a little cheese with you because I can see from your t-shirt that you're dealing with rugby league Ireland. So tell me a little bit about how somebody in the chair decided to get involved with playing rugby league.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so I was a rugby union player in my previous life, um, and then at 20 years of age, I suffered a spinal cord injury from water cross accident. And so I played a lot of sports over my years, so rugby was always one that reads stuff with me. So after my accident, um I thought I would read that possible by the end of November, and in May I was invited to uh a training session. Um and from that I suppose the poachman picked me up was having a bit of rugby knowledge. I knew nothing about rugby because it's not very big in Ireland, but uh he picked me up to have a bit of rugby knowledge and he said to me um after the session, it was before our training session and afterwards, he goes, Are you available in three weeks to come to Edinburgh and represent Ireland and Glencoph? So uh that was it really. And I've just been there ever since. I've represented in every game since, I've been at every training since, and it's been a really good two and a half years.
SPEAKER_03:Wow, we have uh whatever awards international representation alright. Um Tabby, when you were listening to Chloe earlier on and she was talking about how dance was always there for her, did you feel the same when you know a Holocaust accident is something which you never expect, you never plan for, and makes it even so much harder at imagining to actually come to terms with the uh Yeah, 100%.
SPEAKER_01:I reread saying about Chloe earlier because I thought I threw a lot in my life as well, you know, regardless of my spinal injury. Um and I suppose like that dance as long as I've played sport has always been there for me, it's always well done. I've through exams on grage medication, through my exam body, step things, sport, through stuff like something long life sport has always been there for me. Um cross was always primary sport for me. I started when I was eight years old and I became quite competitive in across Ireland and the UK. So I had quite serious injuries other than my spinal injury, like paralyzed my hands, uh two years before I paralyzed my legs, but uh I always look back to it and I always wanted to get back on the body, and then outside of that, whenever I was in an off-season, I was playing rubber, I was playing off. I've been in most two and sport, um, and that didn't take after my accident, so I've had my spinal injury. And when I was in the rehab hospital, I was in the sports holiday, playing basketball, the hot and table tennis, box, everything otherwise. I just got going at it. Um, and same when I left the rehab, then everybody just wants me to come to another sport, and I didn't say that was any of them, I just went to all of it and finding things out and got me called in the next gen campaign. And yeah, it's just been a while around since I've tried that everything.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, were you like Jane with sort of elbows out when you were going into the sports hall? Did everybody think, oh god, give them badly again?
SPEAKER_01:Um I kind of yeah, they always uh they always uh scheduled me for the gym when no one has been going to the gym, so I always went to the sports on the thought that was always playing with you and I went back up to the wards and I ran people up and brought them down at me just to make sure I had some amount of time with it. So yeah, they had this meeting something that were like on the newsland, so yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, I've got no idea why they put you up things if they did to you, but they're like um tell me something.
SPEAKER_04:Well, how long were you in the hospital?
SPEAKER_01:Uh hospital in the back or eleven and a half weeks, and then the rehab hospital only seven.
SPEAKER_03:Seven weeks.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, right. And in that time, like the support, I went, I live only about half the lambs or away from the hospital, and uh and I get to see a lot of the you know the people going in and out and uh um yeah, finding a way to find themselves after such a uh traumatic as a friend of mine who um who had similar um spinal injury after a motorbike accident, and uh he was in there and came out. The supports that are in there are excellent. Um are they excellent for everyone or is it something that you actually sort of find that you need to be in the right place in your case to actually accept this operation?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think it's definitely that both the supports are there if people want to use them. Um and sometimes it can be hard to get people to engage in service, um, especially suffering after an accident. Sometimes if you have showers up, you might go home before you come to ring the hospital, you might be in a better position to take on the feedback and the support. Um, with a spine injury, you tend to just spend your time in hospital. You might never find home since you've suffered your injury or something like that. So I definitely found that when I was there that there was certain people engaging with it and making forward progress, and some people it was just gonna take a little bit longer. I think that's why it only took me seven weeks because from game one I was like like what's the scene it's like to get back out and they're ready to go in life. So um, I think your attitude is the last one back to it.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, very much so what I've just been saying with the rumping. Did you know it's gonna be a four-hour training session before we did that last one?
SPEAKER_01:Um I had a fair, I think I had it on fly, but I don't really care about that. I mean, it's the training long there is uh cross races for you're gonna get you're there for an entire weekend when you spread across races, like it was 20 minutes plus races, but is the house 20 minutes for every day of your life, but you could do that five or six times over a weekend. So I I give it a training, I was always the last person on the basic even doing the lecture or location or something. So I don't care how long the train is the longer the better.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, what position did you play on the age?
SPEAKER_01:But preferably about row. Uh being on so five row was my most preferential position, but I kind of moved around a bit dependent on where I was needed.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, so you went from the scrum to a sport that has got close hoofs.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and since I've started watching me, people are gonna hate this grant strong because they take so long to release that. And I'm an amount of being a fan, I always have been, but ever since I started watching me, it's just it waste so much time, and I wasn't forward, so I could say this, but uh yeah, no, I I don't mind having a strong black home.
SPEAKER_03:I I've never played rugby, I was gay footballer, and I and rugby, I've I've I've grown to really enjoy it, but and the same as you I was kind of looking at the South African match the other day, and I was thinking why.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, if I was in South African position, I wouldn't think that's it. But yeah, from a viewership point of view, I would never watch rugby before. And when I first started to watch it, I was like, There's no roughs, there's no alignments. Like, what point? Whereas I've actually started to watch it now, and the ball and playtime was massive, and they're they're attacking the speed they run off the ball, like they've got the same alignment physicality, if not more, just without the the scrums and the lineance, and it's really, really good. I love that.
SPEAKER_03:And they've got more space because there's only 30 games.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and I've I've started I've started playing Super League with Wigan um after my second Pelican Cup. I wanted I wanted to become better. Um, I wanted more game time in Ireland, so I started talking over England, which is where my coach, the arch coach, is from. And I like he picks me up when I stay on his sleep on his couch every Wednesday evening. So um I thought I was in a lot and I started playing with them, and through that, I became a master fan of the Wigan Warriors Women's team. Um if anyone knows what happens season this year, they won everything that there was to win with a team of basic teenagers. Um I was just every weekend that I was watching them on TV, I just became a master fan of them and what they're getting forward with.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, completely. There was Wigan and weakness and whole things to roll roads and Eddie Wearing, and show my age. The challenge cock final and when we then move towards backward and all the rest. Yeah, got a great wonderful sport. So when you when you actually moved into it then, so like how is it is it the same?
SPEAKER_01:If you want to pitch and you're playing on a full side, so we're in we're having to work, obviously, but we're gonna play five side, but other than that, it is virtually the exact same sport. Um that's what we really like to bring across because there's often a lot of mix up between different rounds forms of wheelchair rugby. So uh that's something we really like to get across, is that we're playing with a rugby ball, we're playing, we take off the team, we we have tackles, we have uh knock ones, they have all the same rules. And the other thing is we wear tags on our shoulders. So when I can get to tackle you, I take your tag. But if you fall off the floor, that's also a tackle complete. So the preferential is to put you on floor also then I can take you. And because they are written up off for white from retrick back by four metres and sit there watching it. So uh yeah, it is but it is virtually rugby that's we're gonna sit in a chair just as physical.
SPEAKER_03:I can tell from the wives smiling came to both of you like me enjoying that physicality.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, I think if people would say um I've always found it very crossface, it's not exactly a very sad good sport for a female to do, let alone in Ireland. So um, but yeah, rugby always came to the front as well. I've always loved that physicality. Um I've always loved playing sport with bands as well. It's always been the thing that throwing up, I always throw it into the lands and I've done it because they're physical, and then I'd be throwing into a women's team and adults off to me, and I'm like, that's my intensity here. So yeah, I love I love this happen.
SPEAKER_03:All right, and working up when we get through a spell, there's nobody's soft over there. No, yeah. And uh you've heard the chair. So the chair is it is a is a specific chair that you've played?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so we use a sports chair that I didn't even I use the same one for basketball or everybody, so I'd like the basketball as well. But yeah, we're playing um playing with a different chair, quite an expensive bit of kit that I didn't realise when I'm into wheelchair sports, um, that can be kind of hard to get your get your hands on, especially when you're first starting like, and then to have them specifically taken for you as well can take longer as well. The money that's involved in that, and then the maintenance of that chair as well, obviously we're getting metal off metal constantly, and applying chairs starting to pick up quite a lot of damage now, but it's 7,000 yards together, they won. So, and I've only bad in about 18 months. So I need to just try and maintain it for as long as I can and keep it keep it picking over.
SPEAKER_03:And where you can hold where's gold? Paramount. And how do you how do you explain the joy of rugby within Carnival, which has got a couple of good football teams, it's got a couple of very good sports-based trainers, um it has particularly good rugby players on the inn side and on the on the boys' side. Um, how do you explain the joy and the passion that you get as you would be?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think they're probably talking crazy. They kind of talking everything I describe. I don't think absolutely crazy. But um, yeah, they um every time I just I my famous line's not gonna fucking work sport. It doesn't even matter what sport is. Software's probably the only sport and nobody tried to do it once over. Everything else I've ever been interested in. If you sit up one people in your house and sport, I'll be too all forget about the conversation that we're having. I'll watch on TV. Um I don't really care what it is. So they all just look at me and they're like, why is it kind of how are you so passionate about this? But it's always have been. Like since such a young age, like I've started printed sports, I've got no idea. I started swimming when I was three, like, so it's just always saying that I'm from a slightly sporty family, like we've always watched sport on TV and we're going to have competing over videos, but but it's just what I base a lot of my life around into my skate, and a lot of times I've running into I'm looking forward to my next training session. If my group decided to be a fitness session, or I'd look forward to it, which isn't something someone say it very often, but I don't care as long as it's good about exercise.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. And tell me how good are we in our how good is the players around, obviously you're brilliant, but how good are you doing?
SPEAKER_01:I don't know about myself, but we've after having an amazing two years really. It started after the last World Cup in 2023, which is when I had my accident and they on 2022, they had a World Cup when I had in England, and then we signed the new coach Ireland for basically some wagon. And ever since he's had a real push on this Irish-based team, bringing the Irish Islands and stuff like that. And we have absolutely excelled since we've took him on. We've won our last two Pelican Clubs. We hosted it for the first time ever our Helping Club in Galway, and we won at King Fisher meeting Scotland and Wales, and then we backed it up this year entirely for two very comprehensive ones on Scotland and Wales again. We've done our first ever tour to France, and we have now found a third in the world, and we have qualified for the World Cup in Australia in November next year.
SPEAKER_03:Well, anyhow, there's how would be a better high on which to finish than that. How can we follow your progress?
SPEAKER_01:How can we check out the social media for Wikipedia's wheelchair or alike? So that's our social media, Facebook, and Instagram is all that. And the Land Probab was on BBT. When it's not showing it next year, so we can't figure out where that's been shown here. We have YouTube channels out there, just keeping on social media and you'll see us popping up. I'm kind of hurting it, so I'm quite fine.
SPEAKER_03:You have everything that is green thing about Ireland, and you bring you to bear on that. Um we spoke about resilience, and obviously, I don't think it was everybody doubt that you've got to be resilience enough to bounce back from your own bus accident and to go on and represent Ireland after only four hours of playing this board. So ladies and gentlemen, the wonder that ladies are coming off for number two. Oh yeah, 10 minutes.
SPEAKER_05:Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome our next guest, Carrie Leonard.
SPEAKER_03:I mean no. It isn't because I have in your guide as a parallel. That's right. Well your your piece of kit would give away what you do for a sporting existence as well. Um you're an archer was your sport. Um that limited of research. Tell us a little bit about what it was like to be at Paralympic Games, the sort of the height of you know the height of sporting excellence, regardless of the way we look at people that were able-bodied or with a disability.
SPEAKER_02:Sure, so getting to a games um was a relief, I would say, because I did try to qualify for Rio. Um stand on Rio qualification. So the way qualification qualification works in archery specifically is the highest number of places available for games around world championships. Um there's eight places, but then at the European championships, that cycle, there were two places, and then the final qualifier, there were three places. So it's not like other sports where you have to run consistently, you can just get one today. So for the Rio cycle, um, my place I was working ninth, um, second, and seventh. So we're gonna need to finish eighth first and just the top three. I missed out very, very narrowly. Um, and then uh I decided I really saw about whether I'm gonna leave the sport or not or continue and to pursue that dream. Um, and I decided that actually the regret in 50 years' time would be higher than the effort required to put into the games. So I decided to go for Tokyo. Um, and Christmas 2019, I um broke my leg putting up the Christmas tree. Um so looking at the timeline for the qualifiers for for Tokyo, um, it was times to do qualifiers for Tokyo, um, and then COVID happened, so it delayed everything by a year. So this ended up being a five-year journey on top of a two-year journey ahead of that to get two games, and then I got the phone call to say you've got the place on the plane. Um, so the overwhelming sense was uh relief. And uh maybe fear, but suddenly in Japan you decide that they were going to open their borders for the game. So it's probably because it was Tokyo, it was a very strange cycle to be a part of for those reasons.
SPEAKER_03:You you could definitely say that again. Um, and they had been Tokyo had been through the innate games, and then I know that there was a number of the locations and the venues that probably kind of scrumped down because we were in COVID at times still at that point in time, so that must have been uh very challenging as well. But but after you got over that fear, the excitement of actually going there will be great. What is that like when you've when you've reached, when you've climbed to the top of the hill in order to get qualification, that sense of relief, do you ease off then a little bit and then try and time your peak performance for when it's going to matter in all of September?
SPEAKER_02:You don't really have that ability because I don't know if people understand this, but actually you get the phone call six weeks before you get off playing. So the ability to ease off and enjoy the moment. Exactly. Um, and then on top of that, you have to keep it to yourself because the press had them at home. So everything is just a lot of contained energy. Um, then you get a power or get a token, and uh suddenly you realize that there's these completely built akid night stadiums that are empty because there aren't a public available. And you also realize that um all the people who are with you on this journey, your family, your coaches, your friends, your governing body, all the people you met along the way, um they are not able to enjoy well with you because they're not allowed on a plane to come to Tokyo either. So you're sitting in the stadium, essentially, alone. So if there's ever a metaphor for sport being very lonely, Tokyo was was it.
SPEAKER_03:And particularly in your sport as well, because you have to you have to shrink the whole world around you, don't you? You have to just focus on that. However, many companies with your 50 years. Okay. Uh and it's all that was the um describe to me what that's like when you're when you're firing your first arrow at a paralytic games. How did you how did you cope with that in your fifth? Or was it just another arrow?
SPEAKER_02:It's just another arrow. I love it to be cinematic. But it was just another arrow, of course, all that emotion is going on at the background. Um, but it is like being another major championship. So you have one day that's very intense, you shoot 72 arrows back to back, and then you go into your head-to-heads. So for this qualification running 72 arrows, you just have to follow your procedure arrow by arrow because the thing about archery that's a little bit different from other sports uh that people don't understand until they're at a very high level, is that it's very easy to lose focus on bones to yourself. And I explain it as though if you get into your car with you finish work in the evening time and you arrive home and you get out of the car. You remember getting in the car and you remember getting out of the car, but you don't remember the bit in between. So if you do that for 72 arrows and you and you just go on to autopilot, it means that your arrows are not as effective as the last. So you have I have a procedure for visualization and that's breathing and that helps me re-engage for every single arrow. Um for the knockouts then, which were the the day afterwards, um, I never experienced being a support. Um, so I went on my off day to watch everyone else's feeding. Um and the teams which had large numbers, all of their teammates were in the stands cheering them on. Um the teams that had solo archers were on their own. So we had this wall of noise coming from these larger teams and the smaller ones being left alone. So I ended up cheering for everybody who was on their own, basically. You know, speaking side, whatever I could just scream from the stands. Um, so the following day when I did buy knockouts, uh, everyone I had cheered from the night before missing the stands cheering moving. So even I was on my own to get all the people in to support you because, you know, this little good deed that I didn't intend to do, but it came back to kind of double or something.
SPEAKER_03:That's why you really love to Irish because we don't really know, yeah. Yeah, yeah. You stepped away from from the the sort of the elite level of of your sport then. Um how was how was that for something which had been I'm not saying all consumer, but something which had kind of dominated your life for so many years, been training, training, training, getting into the zone, getting out to Tokyo. What was it like stepping away from that level?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it was a hard decision. It took a lot and very young. I don't really need to retire from the sport. So I would admit that that is something that was a very big factor in whether I stayed or left. Um I got a lot of criticism at home after Tokyo.
SPEAKER_03:When you say home, is that island or is that like family, yeah. House of home.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, extended family and friends, but I got criticism after Tokyo, which seems a bit strange that I went for Paris. Um, because people had said, look, you had a plan, you wanted to go to the games, and then go back and focus on your career, and you're not doing that, you're back into another cycle of the games. Why are you making that decision? And the reason I made those the decision I did was I went to Tokyo, I became a Paralympian uh for myself, and mainly so people would stop calling me a Paralympian and correct it when I was just a para athlete. So I'm gonna fix that so no one else is making this mistake. There you go. Um, when I went to do Paris, it was about everyone else. So I got the opportunity to be a Paralympian. But by me staying in the sport, it would continue to keep the profile of our tree alive and so people could see it on TV and actually aspire to be um to be a part of being to be an amateur. That took a lot to do. It it it you know impacts a lot of my professional, personal uh opportunities and hopes for my future. Um I honestly couldn't justify doing it for another four years, um, especially when Archery, I'm still the only person representing the country and so uh it was a really hard decision to make, but it was the only one that was in front of me.
SPEAKER_03:And that's what you have to do, you have to make the right decision for you and set you know at any level, but as you say, probably a little bit more challenging for you actually because you're looking at the parents on either side of you who might be going to play a fourth or fifth or sixth games, and that's not something that's that that was entailed to you. And that's sometimes very difficult. Jay spoke about courage. Sometimes it takes way the courage to actually step out of the OEM than it does to step in.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, no one already believes me about this retirement, and Kelly Harrington's rigging my credibility. I'll just point that out. She's just she's not helping the case, but I'm telling everybody, no, I'm retired. And they're like, Hell was she?
SPEAKER_03:And 50 meters. I'm guessing that we could definitely set no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_02:I mean we can combine the two if you like, you know. I I thought A.D. Taylor would involve in person.
SPEAKER_03:Did you involve it as well? Um I was there in Logan. No, I know. And then I was there in tablets when K one purple as well, which was a nice I didn't talk in here. Um I'm sure about my pandemics, I'm not sure about that. Um current preaching over at the United States might not be uh terribly conducive towards going over there, but anyway, I'm not gonna go there now because if you're not.
SPEAKER_02:No, I'm saying we're just discovering sales around the world.
SPEAKER_03:Um I love the fact that you've made it. I love the fact that you did it for yourself, and then that you did it for supporting your family and everybody else, but then also you recognize the fact that what it took out of you and I think you're giving okay. Um very best up with whatever cute holes. Um away from the cat's number, what is the phrase that you got from the office and dark?
SPEAKER_02:Um well feel with some phrase or range.
SPEAKER_03:Feel with range. Um thank you so much for taking the time to begin with today and for the duck before.
SPEAKER_04:So a massive thank you to Melanie Griffith and to Kerry Leonard for putting themselves up and putting themselves out there to tell their stories in front of a very warm and appreciative audience. There's plenty more on the Sport for Business website today. We're looking at the key dates which have been set for the 2026 GAA season. We're talking about the tickets going on sale this morning for the Davis Cup tie against Syria taking place next February the 7th and 8th. We have news of a rugby sponsorship extension within European club rugby and DHL and plenty more as well. We've got another name added to our 2025 Women of Influence and Irish Sport List as well, which is drawing towards its conclusion now ahead of next week's exciting women in sport conference taking place at Tal Stadium in partnership with our friends at Lidl. Do have a great day and um please do subscribe, comment, share wherever you get your podcasts from. If you've enjoyed this uh brief slice of what it was like at yesterday's Active Disability Island National Conference for 2025.
SPEAKER_00:Being here and putting our little nation on the map, it's just you know, this is the stuff of of dreams, right?
SPEAKER_06:It's spinning, it's spinning, Jonathan Sixton dial, and I'm instead of the countries, hey he has a
