In she came to the press conference room, all stealth and quiet through the darkened backdrop, stopping occasionally to take the thanks of this security guard or that member of the Croke Park staff. It was well past midnight now and Katie Taylor’s last ever fight had ended around over two hours before. But nobody was in any hurry, not her and not us. We’ll be long enough without her.
We’ve seen her in these rooms before, drawn and tired, the sheen of a doctor’s work still obvious on her face, a pug’s bruise ripening on a cheekbone or over an eye. This wasn’t that. Taylor looked fresh and relaxed, as if all they’d have to do was flick the lights back on outside and she’d be well fit to glove up for another few rounds.
She had the boxer’s dream ending here. On a night when one Irish fighter left the ring in a wheelchair and another was knocked through the ropes and needed oxygen, Katie Taylor got out of the game unscarred. She left boxing before boxing left her. Of all her myriad achievements, none is more important.
“This was definitely the highlight of my whole career,” she said. “And that’s saying something. I didn’t think anything could get bigger than London 2012 but then MSG [Madison Square Garden] came along. I didn’t think anything could get bigger than that first fight with Serrano and here we are in Croke Park.
“I’m ending my career on top, which is what every athlete wants to do. I’m ending it on my terms and I’m ending as the undisputed champion. And that’s exactly how I wanted to end it. It was so important to me all along to end my career well.”
Croke Park has never seen a night like it. The love for Katie Taylor bounced off the stadium roof in a way that would be hard to fathom for any other Irish sportsperson. She was asked to explain it and initially said she couldn’t. But once she took a stab at it, like everything else on Saturday night, she just about nailed it.
“I don’t know, to be quite honest. I think people, the whole country has seen me in my good times but they’ve also seen me during my devastations as well. I think people really resonate with your vulnerabilities as much as your successes.
“They see me cope with the heartbreak of Rio. They see me cope with the heartbreak of the Chantelle Cameron loss. They see me in my personal difficulties as well. So yeah, I think my story is the story of everybody in the whole country. We all have our good days, our bad days.
“We all know our life is full of ups and downs at the end of the day. And I think that’s something that we can all resonate with. We all have different seasons of trouble, seasons of success. But my disappointments and my struggles have always been in the limelight as well. They see me go through all that and I think people really resonate with that aspect of it.
“But to be honest with you, I don’t know how to answer that question. I don’t know why the adoration is there but I’m just super grateful that it is there.”
The end means so many different things to her. For a start, it means no more of this. No more press conferences, no more nosy parkers asking her to explain her extraordinary life. She’s never made any secret of her aversion to this side of the game, nor her desire to be left alone to get on with being herself. She won’t miss it one bit.
“I mean, I actually don’t like controversy. I don’t like the limelight. I don’t like being the centre of attention. It’s funny how I’m actually in this position in boxing, in such a dark world at times. I’m probably the least likely person to actually be involved in this sport. But here I am.
“I certainly don’t like all the trash talk and all the stuff that comes with it. But thankfully I’ve never had to trash talk or talk down about anybody to actually succeed in the sport. I just let my excellence do my talking. I’ve always let my boxing do the talking, throughout my amateur career as well.
“I always found that was the best way, even to open doors for women’s boxing when women’s boxing wasn’t accepted as a teenager. I determined very early on in my career not to talk but to show my boxing skills and just to let my excellence do the talking and let my talent do the talking. And I’ve kept that throughout my whole career.”
The irony, as Eddie Hearn later pointed out, is that now she’s exiting the stage, she’s talking up a storm. As we beat on into the wee hours, Taylor was enjoying herself by now. When someone asked who’ll play her in the movie, she reckoned Saoirse Ronan would be a good call. “She’ll have to start work on her neck though,” Katie joked. “She has a bit of a skinny neck. I have a big fat one.”
She talked about life and about what will change and what will stay the same. She said at one stage that she’s trying to get her husband to agree to move to Ireland but it was a throwaway line and meant as a gag. Nobody knows a whole pile about her life in Connecticut and she’ll presumably want to keep it that way. But she will be a different Katie Taylor.
“I’ll probably just be a bit more spontaneous. I’ll go away on vacations whenever I want to, stuff like that. My whole life has been one big training camp. It’s been training camp after training camp after training camp.
“I’ve actually got the freedom to do whatever I want here and to just enjoy the fruits of my labour really. I can’t wait for that. I’m looking forward to just putting my feet up and relaxing for a while.”
Nobody deserves it more.