Our Great Coach on this ‘best of’ episode is Billy Walsh.
Billy is the current head coach of the USA Boxing team. He started boxing at age seven in a Christian Brothers gym in Wexford Ireland. He went on to win seven Irish Senior titles, participated in European and World Championships and represented his country as a welterweight in the 1988 Olympics.
He then transitioned into coaching and was appointed Irish Head Coach in 2003. He was the head coach for 12 years and from 2008 to 2014 the team won 7 Olympic medals, at that point it was 25% of all Olympic medals Ireland has ever won.
In 2015 and again in 2016 he won the Amateur International Boxing Associations World Coach of the Year.
In 2015 he was appointed head coach of USA Boxing, and was charged with returning the program to its prior glory. So far this century only 1 male and 1 female boxer has won gold at the Olympics this century, despite the fact that American boxing is the most decorated program in Olympic history and produced champions like Cassius Clay, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Leonard, Spinks, and Oscar De La Hoya.
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