Brackens flying flag for Westmeath in ‘Fittest Family’

As much fun as it looks – but way tougher than you might imagine – is the summation of the experience of Westmeath’s representatives in this year’s Ireland’s Fittest Family competition.

Andrew Bracken, from Ballinabrackey, with children Eoghan (20), Ruaidhrí (18) and Ailbhe (16) are among the 16 families taking part in the event, which opened last week with four families competing.

While the Brackens featured briefly in sequences on the opening show, supporters will have to wait until January 24 to see them compete.

To qualify to get on the show was a thrill for the Brackens, who had long been big fans, reveals Andrew, a 52-year-old suckler farmer.

“We would have been watching it every year and the family would always be saying: ‘We could do that!’,” he says. “Of course it always looks easier when you are just watching it on TV.”

When the call for entries was put out this year, they were among the hundreds who decided to apply.

Within a couple of weeks they were contacted and told that because of Covid-19, they would not be brought to the AIT for fitness testing as happened in previous years, but that instead they were to film themselves taking part in a set of timed fitness tests at home.

Sport is a big passion in the Bracken home, and so fitness wasn’t a major issue: Eoghan, who is about to go into his third year as a science teaching student in Limerick, plays with Kinnegad Seniors and was last year the captain of the Westmeath U20 Gaelic football team; Ruaidhrí was in sixth year last year and was, therefore, one of the students who didn’t get to complete their Leaving Cert.

His main sport is Gaelic football but he also played soccer up until recently, while Ailbhe, who is going into sixth year in school this year, is not alone a member of the Arts Centre in Mullingar, where she sings, dances and does drama, but she is also a keen Gaelic footballer.

Andrew and is a member of two running clubs – Kinnegad AC and Naomh Chiaráín.

Although he only took up running six years ago, he now runs 5ks, 10ks and half-marathons regularly and hoped to run a couple over the summer.

They duly filmed the fitness tasks and shortly afterwards received the exciting news that they had been selected as one of the 16 families who would this year get to take part.

“That was around June and the filming was fixed for September,” said Andrew.

A farm is a great environment for training and so the four worked on building their strength and endurance over the summer, with no idea of what exact challenges they would face when the event kicked off at the competition site, near Bray.

That said, when they launched into competition, they found it way tougher than they had anticipated.

“The first event is something you could never have imagined,” said Andrew, who only took up running in his mid-40s.

But they had great support from their coach, the Cork camogie champion, Anna Geary – and of course support from home from the non-competing family members, Andrew’s wife Ann-Marie and the two oldest of the five younger Brackens, Aishling and Ciarán.