It was a homecoming fit for a hero, and newly crowned World Champion boxer Amy Broadhurst was exactly that as she arrived back home to Muirhevnamor last weekend.
It was incredible, I heard there was something planned, but I never expected that “ said delighted Amy. “To have nearly the whole estate out to welcome you home is an unbelievable feeling.”
Hundreds thronged the streets as the gold medallist was chaffeur driven through the crowds to a chorus of ‘We Are the Champion.”
"It was overwhelming, to see what it meant to people, it makes me want to go out and do even better. When you see how much you can do for the whole community, it just inspires me even more.”
“I’m still coming to terms with everything that has happened over the last week,” she told The Argus..
The 25 year old’s extraordinary victory at the WBA World Championships in Istanbul, where she became only the third Irish female boxer to win gold has been celebrated across the country, but for her local community in Muirhevnamor it was a personal win.
"I felt that support when I was out there, I knew everyone at home was watching, especially the final. But I didn’t feel the pressure, thankfully. I was in my own little bubble out there.”
Her razor sharp focus throughout was crucial, she adds, to keeping her grounded as she fought on one of the world’s biggest stages.
"I’m glad I didn’t feel that pressure, it might have affected things, how I performed. Instead I just enjoyed every moment, all the fights. I was ‘in the zone’ every time I went into the ring.”
The success, she adds, hasn’t come easy, and came after years of training and commitment to the sport she has loved “since I was five years old.”
“I’ve been knocking at the door for years now, there’s been a lot of work to get here. I’ve had the frustration of going out to the world championships several times and reaching the quarter finals. It was very disheartening.”
But her success at European level had spurred her on to “keep fighting, and keep going.”
"It really was a childhood dream of mine to win a world medal, and taking home gold was more than I had ever dreamed of.”
She credits “ a real change in how I approached things, and thought about myself” over the last two years.
"During Covid I was in the ring a lot less, and that gave me the opportunity to grow, and to mature a little bit, and to really start to believe in myself.”
“Without that opportunity I might not have gotten the result I did last week. Everything happens for a reason I think.”
Facing a formidable opponent in Imane Khelif of Algeria, she adds “I knew going into the final it was going to be toughest. She is an Olympic boxer, and definitely the one I would have said would have been tough to beat.”
"But I knew even in the warm up area just before the final that I was ready for this challenge, and ready to be the boxer that people around me have been telling me I could be.”
Amy also had one very special fighter in her corner, the undisputed world lightweight champion Katie Taylor.
"When I read the comments she had made about me, saying I was the future of women’s boxing.. at first I thought ‘no pressure like!”
"But to hear that from the best female boxer that's ever lived helped my confidence a lot."
Amy has sparred with the very best in the business, training with both the current Olympic champion Kellie Harrington and Katie Taylor, ahead of her history making victory in Madison Square Garden last month.
"They are two of the best training partners that you could ask for, so I think that experience has improved me a lot, definitely, I feel like I’m such a better boxer, not just a one trick pony any more.”
The feedback from both Harrington and Taylor has been crucial, she admits, to the change in her own mindset.
"I know that these are not people who are going to lie to me, they are honest about what they see in you, so that has helped me so much. I always had a belief that I was good, that had talent, but I realised that maybe it was time now to see myself as a world champion.”
"For a long time, mentally, it was so hard, having to take so many hits, and setbacks. So when you actually achieve something like this, a world championship gold, it really does make it all worthwhile.”
It comes as no surprise to hear that Amy’s ambitions don’t stop here, and ahead of her could be the biggest prize in an amateur boxer’s career.
"I’m taking a few weeks off to rest, but the Olympic Games in Paris 2024 are what I’m aiming towards now.
But I have a busy two years before that, the Commonwealth Games this July and the European championships in October. The qualifying process gets underway in January next year, so there won’t be much time to switch off, I’m enjoying this time now being at home!”
Tributes to the new world champion have been pouring in over the last few days, and from her local area where Dundalk TD Ruairí Ó Murchú and Muirhevnamor Councillor, Kevin Meenan hve spoken of the pride she has brought.
Deputy Ó Murchú who is, like Amy, a former pupil of St Joseph’s NS, said: “Amy is a wonderful ambassador for sport, for women’s sport, and she is the absolute epitome of effort and commitment leading to results.”
“I have to commend the entire family, including her parents, Sheila and Tony Broadhurst, who have given everything to support Amy over the last 20 years. All the lonely times training and all the hard work in the gym, all the times when she was on the canvass and got back up again, has paid off.”
Cllr. Meenan said: ‘Amy is a beacon of hard work and an inspiration to young people in Dundalk and in Ireland. She is incredibly talented, but acknowledges that it was hard work and commitment which allowed her to achieve her dreams.”
