Kellie Harrington will attempt to qualify for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles after coming out of retirement last year, the Irish boxer said in Dublin on Wednesday.
Speaking to reporters at Technological University Dublin (TUD) at the launch of Dublin City Council’s (DCC) SportsFest on Wednesday, the Olympic champion said: “I will probably try and give it a go to qualify.”
Harrington said it would be “a dream” to represent Ireland at her third Olympic Games.
“I have no pressure on me because, at the end of the day, I’ve done back-to-back gold and that hasn’t been done before in female sports in Ireland, so I’m pretty happy with that,” she said.
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She described qualifying for the Olympics as a “very, very hard process” which will start next April.
“It’s very hard and plus you have to get out of Ireland,” she said. “So you have to win your Irish Championships and you never overlook them either.”
She said qualifying for a third time “would be a big, big dream of mine”.
“If I did get to go to LA, it would be fantastic to get out there and to watch some of my team-mates participate and take medals home,” she added.
Harrington said sport is “very important” for teenagers and adults in Dublin and across Ireland.
“It’s great to be able to express yourself, to release some of that energy – whether it’s a negative energy or a positive energy.
“So to have facilities to be able to practise sports is really, really important, and we’re getting better with that now all over Dublin and all over Ireland.”
She said Irish sports across the board are “really, really levelling up these days” following the Irish success at the European Athletics Championships.
“Sport is on the up in Ireland and whether you’re a male or a female is irrelevant to the situation because everybody gets behind our athletes,” she said.
“It’s great to see people from your own community doing well in anything and it’s great to be able to get behind them.
“It’s about other people, being able to look up to them and look at what they’re doing, and to follow in their footsteps, not just in boxing, in whatever it is.”
