Remembering Colm McCoy

NANCHANG, SE CHINA: I am sad to read about the passing of Colm McCoy, a champion amateur boxer from Kilcullen, writes Garreth Byrne. When in 1960 he was chosen to travel to Rome as a member of the Irish athletics squad in that year's Olympic Games he made Kilcullen proud.

(The late Colm McCoy is feted in Kilcullen on his return from the Lucerne European Championships in 1959. Garreth Byrne is the boy in the centre of the front row. Pic courtesy Kilcullen Heritage Centre.)

I was a boy in short trousers in those days and remember one Sunday rattling a collection tin and to every donor giving a flag with the slogan: SEND McCOY TO ROME. People in those hardship times donated their pennies, sixpences and shillings generously, and McCoy was sent to take his place among the athletes of the world.

Kilcullen has sent canoeists to the Olympics since then, but McCoy set the pioneering example. At a time like this we should once again remember that McCoy's gallant and tenacious sparring partner was Hugh Peacocke. Behind every champion boxer there is a champion sparring partner. And the champion trainer was Captain Cyril Russell from the Curragh.

ED Note: It is interesting to recall that it was in that Rome Olympics, and in the same grade where McCoy competed, one Cassius Clay took home the gold medal for the United States. McCoy didn't get past the first round, being beaten by the Finn Matti Olavi Aho.