SPORTING PASSIONSThe hurling legend DJ Carey talks to Mark Roddenabout his love for handball and more recent passion for golf
"I STARTED playing handball at around nine or 10 years of age. My brother Jack was friendly with a guy called James Brien and James's father, Ritchie, started bringing them to play handball in Goresbridge, which had a new court. One night I started going and took it up from there. We played in county championships the following year but Ritchie brought us twice a week all year around so it was a great interest.
"I kept it up until about 1999 when I just couldn't combine the hurling and the handball. It was a second sport for me but it was one I was fortunate enough to play at a high level. It gave me a big advantage for hurling plus the fact along the way I won a number of All-Irelands and a couple of world championships and got to visit America a good few times.
"I'd say I would have been far more successful at handball than I would have been at hurling, only that handball wouldn't have had the same profile.
"Handball was of huge benefit to me in hurling. If a ball was coming low and hard along the ground I felt I was able to trap it pretty quickly or if it was coming out of the sky or if I needed to handpass it left or right, I always felt I had a bit of an advantage on most players. As well as being able to get out of trouble I was also able to use it in a 20-, 30- or 40-yard pass, which sometimes you wouldn't have been able to do with your hurl.
"It's a pity handball hasn't more of a profile because it's a great game. Obviously when you can't see a ball on television it makes it a difficult sport to follow. Television popularises everything and unfortunately for handball it hasn't got the television appeal. They're trying to do it with squash by coming up with glass courts and a different-coloured ball. But squash is a big worldwide game whereas handball is not, so trying to come up with a marketable product such as getting a different-coloured ball and glass courts, it's not easy.
"My sons are playing handball now. I wouldn't push them; they want to play it themselves. If you want to be serious in another sport, and particularly hurling, handball is a great sport because as well as using your hands it's great for your footwork. And even ballet or Irish dancing - anything that's good for your footwork will help you in any other sport.
"The two sports I would see that are of great benefit to young guys in other sports are athletics and handball. I've played squash, I've played racquetball and in handball you have to use two sides. You have to use your left and your right and you have to use them at all different angles. Whereas in squash or racquetball you really only use one side. If you're left-handed, you're left-handed on the racquet and you hit left-handed.
"I took up golf about 12 years ago and I really enjoy it too. It's something I would love to get better at. It's not an easy game and you need an awful lot of time.
"But whatever I'm into I would have a passion for and I'd like to be the best that I possibly can. I have a handicap of five. I was four but hopefully this year it will come down again. It takes a bit of going but to get to another level it takes more, and from a time point of view I wouldn't have it at the moment.
"I'll be playing in the GAA Legends golf event in April, a project thought up by Bernard Flynn. Each county will have four representatives so I'm looking forward to that. Eddie Keher, Joe Hennessy and Liam Fennelly are on the Kilkenny team with me.
"I think Michael Cleary of Tipperary plays off one so you'll have someone with a handicap of one right up to maybe an 18 or 19 handicap. Golf is a game that's all on the day and if guys perform well and perform to their handicap then it'll be good."
DJ Carey won five All-Irelands and nine All Stars awards with Kilkenny. The GAA Legends All-Ireland Charity Golf Intercounty Championships takes place in La Manga in April, with €100,000 going to the winning charities.
