Olympic rejection and tragic death of father driving Pullough boxer on in pursuit of professional dream

AS an elite level sportsman, Paul Loonam's fire burns brightly from within and he would not need many external motivating factors to drive him on but two huge events, traumatic in very different ways, are certainly powering him forward as he chases his professional dream in boxing.

Just 25 years of age and already the father of two young children, the Pullough man enjoyed a very successful amateur boxing career with the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris a big target from very early on.

The end of that dream, the feeling of rejection and not getting fair play cut deeply and propelled him into professional ranks much earlier than it might have happened – and if he had made that Paris Olympics, he may well have stayed in amateur ranks, chasing other big championships.

At the time, not making the Olympics was the worse thing that had happened in the personable young man's life but sadly, he was handed a large dose of perspective on a plate when his much loved father, also Paul Loonam, was killed in a tragic work accident near Ballinamere in July 2025.

Paul Loonam senior had devoted himself to the development of his son, letting him make his own sporting decisions from a young age but guiding him every step of the way, asking the right questions and encouraging him to make choices when that day came in his early to mid teens. He coached him at St Carthage's Boxing Club in Rahan and his premature death devastated his family and tight knit community.

A hugely popular man who gave great service to Erin Rovers GAA Club, playing a lot of football in the 1980s and '90s, winning championship medals, Paul left a lasting legacy. His son is now in the final stages of preparing for his eight fight as a professional, aiming to continue his unbeaten record when he boxes Rudy Farrell from Belfast for the 55.2kg (super bantamweight) Irish title in the National Stadium, Dublin on Saturday, September 26.

He comes from one of Offaly's most unique and traditional areas in Pullough – in the middle of bogs, it has retained a huge sense of community and pride and in sporting terms, GAA and football is king. His father was a fantastic competitor on the football fields, epitimising all that made Erin Rovers such a good team when they had numbers and a decent amount of quality.

As a young boy, Paul played a lot of football but there was also a great boxing ethos in the Loonam family. His brother Kevin boxed in Cloghan and when St Carthage's Boxing Club started in Rahan, he followed his footsteps there – he was seven years of age at the time and has boxed the whole way up since then. His father Paul could see the passion in his sons and got involved in coaching as a volunteer to help them along the way.

Paul Loonam senior's father Kevin boxed in Manchester for years and Paul snr boxed in Moate as a young lad. When Kevin Loonam passed away, boxing and sport took a back seat with the emphasis on work and feeding mouths. “Boxing wasn't accessible to them. Once that happened, my dad never really took part in boxing but if he had the chance, I'd say he would have,” said Loonam.

Originally from Pullough, Kevin moved to Manchester in search of work and Paul snr and brothers were all born there – they moved back to the Green in Clara when Paul snr was four years of age, living with brothers of Kevin Loonam, before buying a site in Pullough. Sadly Kevin Loonam passed away at just 36 years of age before their house was built but his Italian wife, Rosario proceeded and they have been in Pullough since then – that house was built in Oughter, a townland with a Rahan postal address but very much in the Pullough catchment area.

There is a noticeable number of Italian sounding names in the Pullough area and Loonam is unsure about why this is but he knows his own family back story. Back in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, there was a lot of work in Manchester and there was a sizeable influx of emigrants from Ireland while Rosario and some of her family also went from Italy in search of a better life. They decided to go to a dance in an Irish club one night, met Kevin and the rest was history – they came to Ireland for a while, went back to Manchester where their sons were born and then returned to Ireland.

“When my granfather died, it was her wish to fulfill his dream. Because of the tragic nature of Kevin's death, she would have been well up the list for a council house but she knew it was what he wanted and built in Pullough,” Loonam smiled. Now well in her 80s, Paul is very close to his grandmother and speaks about her with genuine affection.

Coached mainly by his father from seven years of age to 20, Loonam said: “We had a bit of skin in the game with Kevin and he really saw how much we were enjoying it. He decided to support us.”

He began boxing competitively at 11 years of age and didn't get past provincial level for the first two years. In his third year at thirteen years of age in 2015, he won his first national title, qualifying to compete in the European Championships in Russia – with his father accompanying him, this very much whetted his boxing appetite.

He has won three national titles in U13, 22 and elite as an amateur and his success in the Elite on the 2024 Olympic cycle opened up the pathway to Paris for him in the 57kg class – featherweight for people of an older vintage!

He was a talented footballer and was in the Offaly development squad system from 13 years of age but he was “obsessed” with boxing, spending hours watching documentaries and the big stars in action.

Even at 13/14 years of age, he knew he would not be able to keep both sports going – boxing required training five days a week, you couldn't miss Offaly football development squad sessions because you were preparing for another sport and he knew early that one of them would have to go – there was also the little matter of preparing for exams in Killina Secondary School in the midst of all that.

“I was sacrificing certain Offaly training sessions for boxing and I always felt I leaned towards the boxing a little bit. It probably gave me something a little bit different than other people have because not many people box. I thought there was more opportunity for success for me through the bxing.”

Options laid bare

At 15, Paul Loonam senior laid the options on the table for him in fairly straightforward terms. “He said look, Paul, if you want to go far in the boxing or you want to go far in the football, hone in on one. He said I am not telling you what to do but if you want to compete at a good level in both you can do that, but if you want to compete at a really, really good level in one, you need to make your decision.”

Size was an issue. He is a small man and knew that he would have to build himself up, gain muscle and upper body strength for the football whereas he needed to keep his weight down, be as light as possible for the boxing. “They are two different dynamics and coming into my late teens, I had to choose. With Offaly, we were starting into a gym programme and we weren't too sure how that was going to reflect onto my boxing, especially with my weight. My dad left it with me and there was no pressure making the choice.”

The Elite title in 2023 was a huge breakthrough as it showed he was the best in his class in Ireland. The Olympics was a “huge ambition” and it made him the number one contender to go to the qualifiers. He was now in the Sport Ireland set-up but an unfortunate ankle sprain a couple of weeks after his big win set him back for a crucial period.

Unable to train fully, all potential Olympians had their assessments done in this spell and were ranked for this. With four contenders in that class, it came at the wrong time for Loonam and he didn't get the number one ranking.

While acknowledging that he had been injured, it all left a sour taste in his mouth. “I peaked and performed for the competition, not the training two weeks after. I felt a little bit hard done by after that decision.”

He maintained that the assessment was “opinion based” and he wasn't on Olympic funding while the fighter he beat in the semi-final was. “He was their Olympic hopeful and then a lad from Pullough jumps in and beats him in his first ever championship. I didn't find it too fair. I understood with my ankle, I wasn't performing at my best but my performances were done in the Elites, not in the training two weeks after. I felt hard done by.”

He stayed in the amateur set-up for a few months after it, attending foreign training camps in various locations. “I found that really good but I didn't find the set-up suited me the best,” Loonam admitted.

He turned professional before the end of 2024. Apart from boxing a lot more rounds per fight and needing to be a lot fitter, there are two entirely different ethoses in play between amateur and professional boxing. “It is completely different,” Loonam agreed but he dreamt of professional boxing from a young age. “They are two different sports. Amateur boxing is three rounds, a lot bigger gloves. We didn't wear head guards as an elite but there was no real fear factor or damage factor but with the pro game, it is a lot more serious. The gloves are a lot smaller, it is about how much damage you can inflict on the other person. Amateur boxing is mainly about your scoring points. Exhaustion plays a part in the pro game and you have to prepare youself completely right. You have to be professional and I find it always had a calling for me.”

He was aware that professional boxing had a less than stellar reputation in Ireland when he joined the paid ranks but was promised fights in shows in the National Stadium by his manager Jay Byrne.

Another big change is that he now has three-four fights a year where in amateur, he could face this schedule in a couple of weeks. This allows him to fight at a lower weight as he is not under pressure with almost constant weigh-ins. “It is lighter than I was at amateur but I only have to do it a few times a year,” he explained.

He works with a good nutrionist who enables him to meet the weight without under eating or under fuelling. Apart from the last day or two when he has to cut water out of his system, he doesn't find it hard to make the super bantamweight and doesn't spend hours in a sauna trying to sweat off the last bit. “Hot baths the morning of a fight sweats out the water,” he revealed, stating that it is mainly about consistently eating the right food.

His ideal run in to a fight is twelve weeks, though sometimes ones come on board with much less notice and have to be taken on.

He has had the 12 weeks notice for his fight against Farrell, who previously won this Irish title but isn't the current holder after losing two fights ago. Loonam won the Celtic Championship earlier this year to earn his tilt at the Irish belt.

If he wins his next fight, he will move into the top 20 in Europe and this will open the possibility of fights outside Ireland. If he is to make it to the top of the game, fights outside Ireland will determine how far he goes but at the moment, the focus is entirely on home.

He is glad to see professional boxing beginning to thrive again in the south, rather than being concentrated in its Belfast stronghold. Famous English promoter Frank Warren has run two shows here and Loonam said: “Irish boxing needs that interest from the foreign promoters because they are bigger. Hopefully they will be running shows more regularly down south.”

Professional boxing was only a distant pipedream for Loonam when the 2016 Regency shooting at a boxing weigh in brought the sport to national attention for the wrong reasons with the focus on some of the people behind it.

“At the time I was a young buck, I heard about the shooting in the Regency but didn't really know what was going on. I knew it wasn't great stuff but it was very damaging. A couple of years after that, there was no professional boxing in the south of Ireland. When people heard of professional boxing, it was like, oh, crook stuff and didn't really want to have their name associated with it because of what was there at the time.”

Boxing has always been associated with underworld figures from its American heyday as it gained huge popularity from the late 19th century on, entering its golden age in the 1960s and '70s, thanks significantly to Muhammed Ali.

Professional boxing on the way back

Loonam feels there is a change with Eddie Hearn and others coming in and hopes that Irish boxers will get their chance once again. “It was very damaging but my promoter, Jay Byrne who is my manager as well, started running shows when Irish boxing was down from all that bad press. He said he had a lot of challenges to break through and prove to people that he would do this right and there would be no trouble or messing at any of the shows. Since then, no show has went bad, all have went really good and everyone enjoys them. My granny goes to the shows, there is kids around from Pullough that go to the shows with their parents. They really enjoy them and he tries to make them as family friendly as you can do with a boxing show. I think it is changing. We will see in the next couple of years if it continues to go that way.”

While professional boxing is one of the most glamorous sports in the world at the highest level, it is tough for young people making their way and money is hard earned. At Loonam's stage, it is all about developing his fan base at home, raising his profile and getting a substantial following behind him.

Getting funding and sponsorship is just one part of it and he also needs to get supporters to attend his fights. A following of in excesss of 300 impresses the promoters and Loonam has got bus loads of locals from Pullough and surrounds attending his fights but knows he has to widen the net. “Your ticket sales is what allows you to fight and your sponsorship helps you to train,” he said.

He embarked on a “media tour” in Offaly a couple of weeks ago, visiting the premises of businesses who have backed him and meeting supporters. “The idea is to tell people about me, to widen the net beyond Pullough and try and get the whole of Offaly on board. That is really important for me and professional boxing is a numbers games. The more tickets you sell and bums you put on seats, the better chance you have of getting bigger opportunities maybe on a matchroom show. The likes of Eddie Hearn or Frank Warren coming over, they want to see the sales. They don't really care if you are a great boxer but they want to see if you can get 400 or 500 people into the arena.”

He has fought on the undercard in the 3 Arena for Michael Collins only five weeks after the passing of his father and swept along by a wave of raw emotion, he managed to sell 400 tickets – his manager had told the organisers he might manage 300 so 400 was bonus territory.

Loonam is under no illusions that a defeat could halt his progress at some stage and will ask new questions of him but prefers to focus on the positives. He will visualise outcomes and the way things might develop on September 26 but the referee raising the hands of his opponent is not one of the scenarioes he will be contemplating. “Every dog has their day and it is all about who gets it right on the night. I believe that if I get it right, I will win. We will come to that when we get to it and I don't really like to prepare for that because then you look at that as an option.”

He is full time at boxing and is at the bottom climbing up – as you can imagine, it is not simple to make a living but sponsorship and support from individuals is keeping him on the road. “You have to sell a number of tickets to be even on the show and take part. It is not just a matter of turning up and fighting. There is a lot of numbers and logistics.

“They normally say that for the first three years, it is about investing and investing is about sponsors investing in me and me being able to put that into my training. Paying for expenses into my fight. It is like a business. You invest in yourself and hope you get an opportunity to make a return on the investment. It is a hard graft but I am lucky to have people around me who are willing to support, sponsor me. Even some people in the village just sponsor me a few pound. They just want to see me doing well and are not looking for anything back from it. I wouldn't be able to do professional boxing without them and am lucky to have that support system.

“When you are investing, it is about building your base and boxing from home. I am still on my second year and I am looking at another year of fights in Ireland.”

Self promotion is a huge part and while Loonam has a great way with people and is easy to talk to, the whole putting yourself out there does not always come naturally. He knew he would have to embrace it once he turned professional. “As an amateur boxer, you can pay your €20 to enter your tournament and just turn up and fight. As a professional you have to sell your tickets. To fund your training, your equipment and gear, you need to get your sponsorships and that stuff won't come to you if you are not putting yourself out there.”

It means he has to be present both on social media and in person, going to events and meeting local people. He has to approach sponsors himself. “It sort of comes naturally to me. There are some days where I just want to keep my head down but I have to get out there. People like to come on the journey with me.”

A win in a few weeks will help him enormously. “I am on the main event in a big show, there will be 2,000 people at it. The National Stadium will be sold out and that will be a good stepping stone to go up the levels but I need to focus on this and make sure I don't make a hiccup. It is just one fight at a time and hope the big opportunities will come.”

He hopes that the big cards will come to Ireland instead of having to travel to the UK. “That would be great because all the people who have supported me from the smaller shows can come up to the big shows.”

As a superbantam weight, he expects to hit his prime in four years time at 29 years of age and knows that the window of opportunity is a short one – everything going well, he would be aiming to finish by 34 years of age.

It's one of the most physically demanding sports of all – black eyes and broken jaws occur in all physical impact sports but in boxing, you have to hurt your opponent to win and last week, he was sporting a shiner under his eye. Apart from that, there is the harsh physical training regime and he travels to Dublin four-five times a week to spar and train. “It is very physically demanding but it is mentally demanding as well. You have to be on the ball all the time. Your training is very vigorous and it is not the stuff you can just go with the flow. Every day, you are working on something, building towards something, changing something or tweaking something. It is really hard and the training camp is the really hard part. The fight night is just get out and show the hard work you have put in.”

Great memories of a much loved father

In the middle of all that, Loonam is still going through the stages of grief for his late father and the date of 8th July 2025 will remain on his memory for life.

He had fought at the end of April and was in a swimming pool with his son on a well earned holiday in Spain near Alicante when he got the dreaded phone call. He had been chatting his father just three or four hours earlier about boxing – his father had heard “really good news” that he might be fighting in the 3 Arena and they agreed to chat later that evening.

“Being over there, was crazy at the time,” he recalled and the following hours were mayhem as him, his partner Karolina (A Polish native) and son Gianni got a flight out of Spain that night, coming home via England where they had to endure a ten hour stopover in the Airport.

Gianni is now two and a half years old while Karolina gave birth to their second son, Emilio just under three months ago – he is young to be a father to two boys but after the birth of their first son, him and Karolina decided that they wanted a second sibling close in age.

He spoke with great pride about his father. “There is two kind of father-sons relationships in sport. There is one where the father is pressuring the son. You can kind of see the son wants to do it but the father is putting a lot of pressure on. It was never like that with me and dad. He knew I wanted to do it. Of course, we had hard days and we had a few rows. That was just normal but once we settled in after two or three years of him coaching me, when I was 13-14, we really found a rhythm in our father-son, boxer-coach relationship. There was no disagreements.

“My dad's ego wasn't big at all and he used to bring me to other coaches to learn off them. He used to practice that stuff with me himself and he used to take so much off the national coaches. Our relationship as father-son and boxer-coach was just perfect. We would always end up chatting about boxing but that was just because we were both really interested in it. There was no pressure, it was, right son, if you want to do this, I'll support you.

“We used to fly to England for sparring, he would drive me all around the country. We would spend days driving just to get sparring and go to different gyms. He would probably have rather played golf but because I wanted to do it, he was a huge support. He would go anywhere and give anything just to see me doing what I wanted to do. He saw the drive and passion in me and said, I will help my son.

“It was probably the opportunities he never had because his father died at a young age. He was probably trying to give me them opportunities. I would never really have realised that at the time but reflecting since my dad's passing, his dad died when he was only very young and the father my dad is, he was trying to be what he didn't have and I was very lucky to have that.”

When Loonam turned professional, he went to a different head coach but “my dad was always there and stayed a huge influence.”.

“Professional boxing is a different sport with different tricks but no one knew me better than my Dad and he was there all the way through. Having him there was an essential part of my team and if he was alive, he would still be an essential part of my team.”

He was asked about the challenges when teenagers begin to separate from their parents in their teens and forge their own paths and separate identities.

That didn't create a problem for them and their issues were more around Paul's childhood friends going to discos and beginning to socialise. “I kind of wanted to go as well and my dad wasn't too keen on letting me go. He knew we would be trying to get a few cans and the lads would be trying to get a few drinks before the disco. The fags were on the scene and he was just trying to steer me clear from that but to be honest, I just had such a passion for boxing that maybe I would go to the disco but I wouldn't be drinking or anything like that. I'd make sure I was still waking up early the next morning to go training. We had a little bit of riff-raff at that time when I was growing into an adult but it wasn't too bad. I knew if I wanted to be different and have a bit of a different life for myself, I would have to live differently.

“Sometimes I disagreed with what he said but I knew he was right at the back of it all. A little bit of that but it wasn't too bad. He knew I wanted to do this and he wasn't putting too much pressure on me, he was just guiding me the right way. Sometimes I would go off that path but I knew that was the right path to go back on.”

Diet and lifestyle is crucial for professional sports people and Loonam restricts his drinking to a couple of times a year. “Christmas and I wouldn't be able to drink much because I am all the time training. Food would be more my thing. If I got a nice pizza, that would be more for me.”

His father was just 62 years of age at his passing and his son is still “learning to accept it”.

“My dad wouldn't want us to be hung up on not accepting it. He used to say, everyone has their time and unfortunately that is what it is. Now it is all about trying to look after my own family and being there for my mam and all my siblings and my granny. That is what he would want. It doesn't get easier but it gets different. I am probably not as triggered as much into feeling very sad but when it hits, it hits and it will always hit for the rest of my life.

“I was very lucky to have my dad for as long as I did because he was just 12/13 when his dad passed away, I was 24. I was lucky to have my dad as a great role model on how to be a father, never mind all the boxing stuff but how to live a good life as a man and I am absolutely blessed to have had that. You have to feel grateful and all that pain is all the love that you are missing and we were so lucky to have all that great love for one another and all the family. Now you just have to move on and look after what you have now. If I can embody my dad now pushing forward, I will be doing a really good job in life.”

Funnily enough, he doesn't need to use memories of his father for motivation at fight time. “The day after the funeral, it was what am I going to do. Am I going to sit around and go down to the pub or am I going to go back training. The day after his funeral, I hit the roads running that morning for an 8k run. The body was wrecked because it was a hard few days but it was really good for my head and I knew dad would want me to get back training. Straight away I got back boxing. The first few weeks were a bit shaky, going back to remembering doing pads with my dad and him coaching me, always behind me, giving me tips, guiding me. That was all gone but I felt he was here with me in my heart.

“The first couple of weeks were tough but now I am training every day, knowing he is not going to be there physically but he will be there in spirit, the inner voice giving me tips.”

His mother is Carmel and Paul is the youngest of five: Aisling, Sinead, Kevin and Roisin.

Asked how long does he give it before deciding to go a different road if he doesn't make a big breakthrough, he said it is one fight at a time at the moment, “keeping knocking on that door and the opportunities will come”.

He hasn't a monetary target by 30 and will instead see how it is working. At the back of it all, he believes he brings something to the ring that most others don't have and he hopes this will “shine through”.

“As a boxer, your mindset has to be all or nothing and you can't be looking at what might happen but there will come a time when I have to be realistic.”

Him and Karolina will have those chats at the right time but at the moment, September 26 is the only date on his mind, win that fight and “see what opportunities present”.

He does hope to be retired from boxing at 34/35, aware that his own sons will be growing up and could be boxing by then. “I want to make sure I am in good health for when they are growing up and be part of their lives. Making sure my health is intact is always number 1 priority for me. If a call had to come in four or five years time that my health is not doing the best, I am getting a lot of injuries or can't prepare myself to my best, I will have to look at that then. Now it is just hell for leather, one fight at a time.”

After sixth year in Killina Secondary School, he worked on building sites but it didn't suit because of his boxing. If he has to pack in boxing down the road, he hopes to stay involved in the sport in the fitnes/coaching side of things and will study in this area in the next year or so. “There could be a time when I am out for six or seven months because of an injury and it would be nice to have something on the side I am really interested in, be it boxing, boxercise, weight lifting, losing weight, stuff like that.”

What is the different ingredient you bring to the ring?

“I think it is my boxing IQ. When I get into the ring, unless they are a really good opponent, I always feel I have the edge in terms of boxing intelligence. That comes from watching boxing since I was seven, studying boxing all the time. Every weekend, the boxing is on the TV. I am kind of a student of the game, it is not about just getting in and fighting. It is how to fight the right way, how to set up your punches, how to set traps for your opponent to fall into. I feel that in the ring, my boxing IQ is untouchable. I am letting that show now and I think I will shine on September 26. That just comes from years of being a student of the game and learning from all the best coaches in Ireland, even looking at the best fighters and try and take the best bits from them. I feel that IQ will show now in the next couple of fights.”