Active South Dublin March Sports Star: Jack Woolley

SOUTH Dublin Taekwondo star Jack Woolley will be on the plane for the Olympics in Paris this July.

The Tallaght lad secured qualification for his second Olympic Games after enjoying success at the European Qualification Tournament in Sofia.

After finishing as the sixth nation in the 2023 end-of-year Olympic rankings, Jack was one place outside the top five auto-qualify quotas for Paris and was required to attend the European Qualification event.

Seeded number one, Jack had a bye in the round of 16 requiring him to achieve two consecutive victories to achieve one of the two tickets to Paris available.

In the quarter-final Jack overcame Finland 2-0 which led to a nail-biting decider with Albania.

The young Albanian took the lead one round to nil, requiring Woolley to win the two remaining rounds in the best of three format.

Woolley picked up his momentum and secured the win and a quota to Paris for Team Ireland.

“It’s only four months, it’s going to fly in.

“I’m going to prepare that this is the best time of my life,” Jack told The Echo “It starts right now – we go to training camp straight away and Europeans in a few week’s time to it’s going to be a busy few weeks,”.