Kyran Bracken MBE

What was your sister Louise like?

Louise was a brilliant sister to grow up with, never mind as an adult! As a child, she was a bit of a tomboy, always mucking about with us boys in the garden, playing rugby and our made-up games. Lousie played lacrosse and was a real tiger of a character. 

She was a bit aggressive on the pitch and always warned for fouling other players! She also played tennis and horse riding but never really found her own sport. 

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Louise became a semi-professional athlete quite late, didn’t she?

Louise started getting into triathlon slowly and did it quietly, too, participating in a few charity events and doing well. 

That’s when she got the bug and started taking it really seriously—getting professional coaches, a training regime, and dieticians. 

Her triathlon training and competing was a release for her from running her 100-strong employee business and being a mum. 

She’d be up at 5 a.m. every morning for a swim before work, training at lunchtime, and cycling in the evening, all while running the company and running the family. It was just so impressive to become a semi-professional athlete and represent Ireland and Great Britain while doing all that, too.

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I think Louise probably regretted not finding her own sport that she loved—triathlon—until she was in her forties. That’s partly because triathlon didn’t exist when she was growing up!

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Louise got her kids into every possible sport on the planet, determined to help them find their thing as youngsters, and was a force to be reckoned with as a mother on the side of a pitch.

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What are the issues with access to sport in Jersey and the UK?

There are many barriers to sports, primarily financial. For example, if you want to be a triathlete, you’re going to need a good bike, which can easily set you back one to three thousand pounds. And then, if you want to compete, you’ve probably got to travel, which puts a lot of pressure on families to support their kids. 

This can lead to youngsters underperforming and even stopping their sport, even when they have the potential to be great athletes, perhaps even Olympic champions. 

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While the governments are working on bringing mass sports to the masses, Louise wanted youngsters to tap into many lesser-known sports. That doesn’t mean all those sportspeople become elite athletes, but just that they have access and opportunity. 

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What about the kid in the class who wants to play Padel and has potential, but there are no competitions in Jersey? He needs to travel the world and get coaching in Portugal or Spain. So, how can we help make it happen?

Louise’s dream was always to find aspiring athletes who needed help. Hopefully, her legacy foundation will do just that.

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What are your aspirations for the Foundation?

If the Foundation achieves what we all hope it will in the next five or ten years, then I can imagine one or two Olympic athletes earning a medal or becoming world champions in the sport they love with the help of the Foundation. 

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While acknowledging that it takes many players to achieve this level of success, we want to be part of the DNA of their journey and success story.

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