Rising tide of nostalgia lifting GAA Rounders to great heights

By John Harrington

Nostalgia is a powerful feeling because it directly activates both the brain’s memory and emotion centres, triggering a sugar-rush of dopamine.

We all like to occasionally warm ourselves by reminiscing on happy times past, but why settle for that?

The booming popularity of GAA Rounders suggests people are increasingly inclined to relive fun times rather than just remember them.

It doesn’t just have to be a sport you loved playing with your friends in the school yard or on the green during the summer, you can rediscover it as an adult and enjoy it all over again.

GAA Rounders President, Paula Doherty, is the perfect case-study for how the sport welcomes back prodigal children.

She played Rounders in Castlebar from the age of 11 into her mid-teens, but then, like many others, drifted away from the sport.

She only rediscovered it 2022, so when you consider she’s now the sport’s first female President at a time of unprecedented growth, it’s fair to say that things have escalated pretty quickly.

“It’s been a short but very busy time, I suppose”, says Doherty.

“Initially I was just looking for something for me to do. I suppose we all live in that fast-paced environment where a combination of family and work can be all-consuming, but I didn’t want to be just defined by work and family, as much as I love them.

“I was looking for a social outlet to have something to do that wasn't too taxing or too demanding, so when I found that Rounders was being played at adult level competitively I was really surprised but also delighted.

“I went along to a club just outside of Castlebar called Breaffy and immediately found myself knee-deep in competition.

“I suppose I'm a natural kind of organiser and wanted to get involved more, and I could see that the club were looking for people to step up at club and committee level and so I found myself taking on the role then as Secretary of the club and enjoying it.

“Then that led to being National Secretary for GAA Rounders. And then, lo and behold, last November, the opportunity came to put myself forward for the role of Uachtarán and here we are.”

In four years with Breaffy, Doherty won four Senior Women’s All-Ireland titles, two Senior Mixed All-Ireland titles, and three All-Star awards.

GAA Rounders offers that opportunity to represent your club on a competitive stage and win team and individual silverware, but Doherty believes much more important is the fact that it’s a hugely social sport that caters for players of all abilities.

“I think the big draw for most people is that it’s fun and you can pick it up easily regardless of your age, your gender or your fitness level,” she says.

“You're able to get involved and step out onto the pitch relatively easily. You don't have to come along with a background in Rounders, you don't have to have played it underage.

“It's a sport that you can pick up so quickly. You can find yourself on the pitch either socially or competitively competing in championships without having too much experience behind you. You can then develop that over time and all the while have this great social network around you where you're meeting new people and you're having fun.

“For an awful lot of people, it's about that sense of nostalgia that they're doing something that they would have done in the past, and they're coming back to it now.

“They're reconnecting with people that they would have known in the past, they're developing new friendships and they're giving themselves an outlet to get involved in sport or come back to a sport they thought they’d never have the opportunity to play again.

“It also broadens the GAA offering for people. It gives another pathway for participation, particularly for people who may not stay involved in other codes, but still want that club connection and community.

"They might no longer be able to participate in other codes, but they want to feel connected with that GAA community and that's something that GAA Rounders can offer. For me, above everything else, it's just the fun that makes it such a great sport.”

A unique selling point of GAA Rounders is that it’s the Association’s only code that allows men and women to play on the same team alongside one another in competition.

This dynamic has seen the sport become the unofficial match-making wing of the GAA!

"Well, I know that some clubs would refer to training as date night!” laughs Doherty.

“I know of four couples on one particular team and in Breaffy Rounders we’ve also had a few couples with one of them recently married.

“That's huge part of the appeal for people, the fact they can treat the sport as a great social outlet, because when you have both men and women involved there’s going to be that draw to finding people.

“Another really fun dynamic is that you often have situations where you have parents playing alongside children and siblings playing with one another.

“We once had a mum, dad, and a son playing together on the same mixed team in an All-Ireland Final.

“I was at an U14 event last weekend and a lot of the parents who were shouting on their children from the sidelines on the Saturday were themselves playing for the club the following day.

“It was a great illustration that whatever age you are you can take part in the sport. Success at whatever level, juvenile or adult, is about participation and people playing and enjoying the game."

Since 2020, the number of GAA rounders clubs has more than doubled and there’s no sign of that growth slowing down.

It’s a very simple process for GAA clubs to add Rounders as a code, and GAA Rounders also make it very easy to set up standalone Rounders clubs.

It’s also an inexpensive sport to get started, all you need initially is a bat, a few sliotars, and some base-mats.

In recent weeks a pilot programme that saw equipment packs distributed to clubs in 10 different counties elicited a huge response with hundreds of children in the Go Games age-bracket taking up the sport in an inclusive, non-competitive environment.

Doherty is confident that if GAA Rounders can be put in the shop window the game will sell itself more and more in the coming years.

“It’s a really exciting time for the sport and I’m thrilled to be able to drive the organisation onward,” she says.

“One of my goals is to obviously make the sport more accessible and to give it to that wider audience and to draw in as many people as we can.

“It's about making people aware that we are now a thriving, dynamic organisation at national level and that playing Rounders doesn’t end at the schoolyard, that it's still going on. We’re delighted to be honouring tradition while building a modern sport.

“We're building really something exciting and it's about inviting that outside audience in to let them know that here we are, come along and give it a go.

“I’m confident that if people do give a go they’ll be hooked because it’s a social sport, it’s a fast-paced sport, and it’s as competitive as you want it to be.

“GAA Rounders is something that everybody can get involved in.”

For more information on GAA Rounders go to https://www.gaarounders.ie/