There are a few Irish sports stars who have made the, sometimes awkward transition from elite player to TV personality, but the speed and ease with which Anna Geary has done so is particularly striking. The Famed Camogie legend retired from competitive sport at the still youthful age of 28 but with a huge determination to succeed at her new career. The opportunity was there for her and she grabbed it with both hands, unwavering in her desire to add another accomplishment to an ever increasing list of achievements.
Of those said achievements - where do we even start? All Ireland titles in schools, club, county, province. Captain of Cork, European Camogie champion, Cork Rose of Tralee, University of Limerick graduate, 1st Class Hons Post Grad 2013 in PR & Communications, DipLoma in Business & Life Coaching, numerous individual awards and ambassadorships. It is fair to say what Anna puts her mind to she achieves.
Post sports career, she turned her hand to the media side of things and so jumped headfirst into radio, a Coach on Irelands Fittest Family since 2015, a Presenter on TV3s The Seven O'Clock Show, a Pitch side Presenter in 2017 Eir Sports Match Night Live, competed in Irish Dancing with the Stars, a Sunday Game Analyst RTE, a Sky Channel piece 'Irish TV' - working on 6 part series on Camogie. She has been voted in the top 50 Most Influential Women in Irish Sport, Panelist / Pundit Camogie Matches for RTE. Had a Sports Radio show on Today FM and even did daily workouts for her followers over the Covid lockdown. Recently Anna has undertook a Lifestyle Coaching career, Motivational Speaker and Writer. She uses her recent status for empowerment of others such as Sky Sports “Living for Sport Athlete Mentor”, working with adolescents to help them to build transferrable skills to use across all aspects of their lives and is one of the founding members of the Women’s Gaelic Players Association while also being a Special Olympics Ambassador.
She admits to being fiercely competitive, extremely determined, enjoys accomplishment and ambitious in what she does, recognising that she has earned her feats and success, through hard work, improvement and putting in the time to get better at the task in hand. What has came across Anna's work in recent years is a thought for others, not just herself. The documentaries, the coaching roles, the wanting to changes perceptions of woman in sport all point to someone with concern for others and a want to make a change in peoples lives for the better. Her personality shines through on all the mediums that she works through and the charisma is enhanced by an infectious enthusiasm. Basically speaking, Anna helps invigorate others and one cant help but want to strive to do better simply by viewing Anna's approach to life. Always trying new things, she shows us that life is to be lived and experienced, enjoy the highs and use the lows.
A North Cork native, Anna was steeped in the GAA and played Camogie for her hometown club of Milford and tasted national succeed bother there and with her school St Marys, Charleville. Onwards to intercounty sport and 4 All Irelands with Cork later, numerous All Star awards and Anna was ready to continue the upward trend. The GAA gave her so much and perhaps this realisation was more profound following her recent documentary 'Anna Geary: Why girls quit sport' which delved into the topic and highligthed the shicking statistic that by the age on 13, a mind boggling 50% of girls drop out of sport. Having been driven on by a GAA mad family, the thought of such did not occur to her and bringing this to the national stage, addressing the issues young girls have in relation to sport, image and social media became a passion project for Anna. The realisation that sport should be fun and not just about solely winning was a stark message. Being a hugely competitive sportswoman meant Anna focused on winning primarily therefore the enjoyment side of sports participation needs to be adapted by coaches and trainers, moreso when dealing with young athletes. Trainings and matches cant be taken with the seriousness that adult undertake. We need to keep our kids playing, not quitting. If they dont enjoy GAA, take up another activity. Social interaction, belonging to something more than ourselves and getting the nose away from the phone is essential. We need to keep active, we have a hopefully long life ahead of us and will need our physical and mental faculties to last as long as possible!
Hard work, belief in yourself and think of others. The rise of Anna Geary thankfully shows no slowing! A super role model for our kids!
Photo credit: Alan Betson
Photo credi: Gerry Monney / Sunday World
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