Dempsey set for his move into pro ranks
By Caitlin Rundle
TALLAGHT native, Adam Dempsey is looking forward to taking his first steps into professional boxing under the guidance of promoters Shamrock Boxing, based in Luton.
Now living on Achill Island, the 20-year-old is a seven-time Connacht Champion and 2017 Irish National Junior Champion and his journey into paid boxing has been anything but ordinary.
Tallaght native Adam Dempsey will box in the pro ranks
Until Dempsey and his family moved to Achill Island when he was 11 years old, he was not even seriously interested in sport.
“I was more or less just hanging around the streets with my mates and stuff. I wasn't really a sporty person,” Dempsey recalled.
“It was only when I moved out of Dublin that I started sports. Going from the city to Achill Island, like there’s nothing to do here, so my dad was like ‘why not just join boxing?’, and I was like, ‘yeah, I can do that.’
“He searched up the nearest clubs, but that was far from us, it was like 40 minutes.
“My dad was like f**k it, I’ll make a club for you, so he ended up making up a boxing club, and that’s where that started.”
Even with Dempsey’s late entry into sports through Achill Boxing Club, he said he recognised his potential early.
“I don’t know, I was actually just good at it. I don’t know why, it was just one of my hidden talents that I’d never discovered,” Dempsey said.
“After I started doing it, people would be like ‘oh you’re really good, even starting out there, you have potential to actually be good at it.’”
Dempsey said one of the reasons he decided to sign with Shamrock Boxing was because of an experience with the club from earlier in his career.
“There was a coach that I knew from my amateur background, when I was 16, Mark Byrne,” Dempsey said.
“He wanted me to go over to Luton, to him, because my dad showed him a video of me, and he said ‘oh he’s really good, can you come over and do a camp with us?’
“He flew me over and I was trained as an amateur in his gym, but I also got to take a look at some of the professionals that they had in their gym, and I got to train with them and spar them, and it was actually fun.
“They were like, ‘you know, this could be you in a few years.’”
It was the connection and comfort around Byrne that made Dempsey confident in his decision to sign with Shamrock Boxing.
“We already know each other really well and he looked after me a lot over there, so I think it’s only fair that I take him on as a coach,” Dempsey said. “I’ve been over there, the distance doesn’t bother me at all, it’s just familiar faces to me.”
Dempsey will be making the journey to Shamrock Boxing for the first time since signing in April for two weeks of training, before returning in May for a further six weeks.
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