Katie Taylor reassured people that “40 is the new 30” at her public workout session in the Helix theatre three days out from her final professional fight against Flora Pili in Croke Park.

The heroes of the previous day’s press conference had largely been the fellas who organised the fight but they took a back-seat on Wednesday.

A boxing ring was plonked in front of the stage for the boxers to show their moves in front of the media and interested members of the general public.

Before things got underway, the auditorium was stuffed variously with Youtubers, mainstream TV reporters, print journalists – a good number of whom are regulars on the GAA beat – as well as massive tattooed lads in Matchroom T-shirts.

The Youtubers fizzed with hype-man enthusiasm and many of them seemed to know one another, clasping each other’s hands in greeting as they passed. They weren’t lacking in improvisational dynamism, whipping out their phones for pieces to camera at opportune moments, inviting one another to participate in livestreams.

The GAA reporters were more aloof and huddled in the corner chatting about Gabriel Bannigan’s resignation as Monaghan football manager. In between, they cast their eyes warily around the room. “You wouldn’t want to mess with the wrong lad, would ya?” one of them observed.

The reporters’ main concern was whether Taylor would speak to the press pack afterwards. Word filtered through early on that this was unlikely to happen today, despite confident suggestions to the contrary yesterday.

It’s fair to say that they – I say ‘they’ but this writer was among them – exuded more ‘can I speak to the manager?’ energy than the Youtube crowd, who looked like they were just buzzing to be there.

Long before Taylor arrived into the ring to rapturous applause, the reporters were resigned to the fact that she wouldn’t be speaking to them.

Before we got to Taylor, each of the fighters on the exhaustive undercard were summoned into the ring to strut their stuff.

The first person out was Dubliner Bobbi Flood – three wins from three bouts – who danced around the ring throwing jabs and combinations at his imaginary opponent. He was accompanied on the speakers by ‘Move or Not’ by Purple Disco Machine (Fair play to Shazam).

There were occasional cries of ‘G’WAN BOBBI!’ from the crowd in the auditorium.

One by one, all the boxers followed suit. One of the more well-known figures was 35-year-old former Olympian Emmet Brennan, who appears in only his fifth professional fight against his English-born Welsh opponent Taylor Bevan, a former Commonwealth Games silver medallist.

One of the protagonists from the night’s other female fight was in attendance, the bizarrely nicknamed ‘Meatball’ Molly McCann, a 36-year-old former UFC star who only signed on with Matchroom as a professional boxer last year. She’s undefeated in four fights so far and takes on Sylwia Doligala in a bantamweight bout.

‘It’s f***in’ Dublin, isn’t it?” she declared in an extremely strong Liverpuddlian accent (the Brookside producers would have asked her to tone it down) when she was asked to sum up her level of enthusiasm for Saturday night.

Katie’s workout was preceded by a tracksuited Duuuublin rapper called Casper Walsh, with whom this writer wasn’t familiar.

Then Taylor emerged into the light, saluted her adoring public and performed a slick and lively workout with her coach Ross Enemait.

“I feel great, I think 40 is the new 30, isn’t it?” she told the chap from DAZN after her workout.

“I obviously just turned 40 a few weeks ago but I feel great, thank God. It’s been an amazing few months, preparing for this fight.

“I’m expecting a tough fight but this is what I’m made for, this is what I’m born for.

“This isn’t going to be a walk in the park, I have a tough, young challenger in front of me, but I purposely chose a tough challenger for my final fight.

“I built my whole reputation on taking tough fights throughout my whole career. Why treat my last fight any differently?”

Katie Taylor delighted onlookers at her open workout at the Helix this evening and there was a special moment for one young fan in particular pic.twitter.com/UtE2uf45wu

— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) September 2, 2026

A big theme of Taylor’s this week has been her legacy in inspiring the next generation of girls to take up boxing.

After her workout was concluded, a 10-year old girl called Clodagh Keating was invited up on stage to spar with Taylor. Young Clodagh was overcome with emotion during it all and was almost screaming crying as Taylor put her boxing gloves on the young girl.

Clodagh is not a member of a boxing club but she may be after this. It was a memorable day for the young Katie Taylor fan.

It was a less fruitful day for the reporters, who slunk away home having spoken to no-one important. Ironically, they could have just watched it all on Youtube.

Watch Katie Taylor v Flora Pili in their undisputed World Super Lightweight title bout live on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player on Saturday from 8pm, listen live on RTÉ 2fm or follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app