Overcoming bumps on the road

From driving trucks to passing ice-cream cones and now pumping dumbbells, Dublin native Greg Byrne’s journey to becoming a personal trainer in Cavan hasn’t been straightforward.

The affable 61-year-old has been interested in health and fitness since his teenage years, since starting out at one of Dublin’s first public gyms - Grafton Health Studios.

At the time, fitness was a side hustle for Greg, who owned transport and logistics company Greg Byrne Logistics Transport. He bought a house and married his wife Clare age 22.

Living in Finglas, life was good for, and the couple celebrated the arrival of their first and only son, John.

In 1998, Greg's world though was turned upside down when he was diagnosed with viral meningitis, which left him hospitalised for four months. Following discharge, he spent two years in recovery undergoing intensive physiotherapy and speech therapy.

“My speech never came back,” he says, adding that the condition “affects my brain more than anything else”.

Greg’s co-ordination on the right side of his body was worst affected. However it improved wit physio. But even now Greg says he wouldn't be able to play a Playstation where quick hand eye coordination is necessary.

“I suffer with that, it was worse,” he remembers.

Through it all and to this day, Greg says Clare was his rock.

“She made me fight through,” he recalls.

“I love my wife, I love her more than when I married her first,” shares Greg of the woman who helped him though one of the most difficult items of his life.

Asked how the diagnosis affected his life, Greg paused as he recalled those dark days.

“I couldn’t lunge or squat,” he states first, describing how he also was not allowed to drive, although that didn’t quite stop him.

“I could drive, I wasn’t meant to drive but I was driving,” he laughs.

“I had to push myself to do things,” he said, however he took the decision to sell his logistics company which “devastated” him.

“That was my business for 19 years and then, when I was sick, I had to sell it all because I couldn’t do it anymore.

“It just stopped overnight.

“For me I was so fit and so active... it was devastating.

“I couldn’t do anything about it, it was a very strange feeling.”

“I sold everything to move [to Cavan] for a new start” 21 years ago.

Having nearly ended up in Kells, the Byrne family viewed a house in Ballyjamesduff, when Greg immediately thought “that’s our house.”

“It was a new start for me especially.”

Another fresh start came in the form of ice-cream for Greg, who began working for a company in Meath before his entrepreneurial head turned to starting his own Cavan soft serve business 15 years ago.

Not one for being told what to do, Greg said: “I love it, I’m my own boss, I do my own hours.”

With a lasting speech impediment from the diagnosis that forced him to leave his former livelihood, Greg explains how he has had his fair share of prejudice with some wrongly assuming he might be operating under the influence of an intoxicant.

“It hurt,” he said. “I’ve a speech impediment.”

He recalled one occasion when somebody even reported him to the guards.

“It happens,” he said, adding “guards know me.”

“I don’t judge anyone, I always give them a chance,” he said, hoping for the same leeway from others.

“I won’t be upset or anything, I need you to say ‘Greg say again?'

“I don’t mind repeating myself.”

On the flip side, Greg enjoys watching kids’ faces light up upon his arrival.

He is a well-known face now on his routes, and one of the highlights of his career to date was when he gave out 1,800 free cones to the staff at Cavan General Hospital to say thank you after the pandemic.

Hospital staff members are close to Greg’s heart.

“They looked after me,” he recalled.

With plans to retire next year, rather than taking a lighter load Greg has been working to get his personal training business Body & Soul Fitness off the ground.

He qualified as a personal trainer at the National Training Centre two years ago.

Currently he does in-person, one on one classes at Fit Forever Gym in Cavan and he aims to build the business further in the future.

Greg’s ultimate goal is to teach older people how to “train properly” and take care of their bodies with both training and nutrition.

He also trains himself every day between cardio, weights and band work.

“It's a lot,” he admits, adding that at his age he aims to “maintain what I have”.

“As you get older, you lose muscle mass so you have to keep it.”

“I don’t feel my age, I don’t feel sixty years old,” he says, let alone over it.

“Older people have to lift weights because your body mass reduces so quickly.”

He describes the venture as his “back up plan” for “keeping motivated in the years to come.

“It doesn’t have to pay my bills, my mortgage is paid.

“It’s more of a hobby than a job.”

Looking back on a difficult path, Greg is happy with where he ended up in life.

“For me it was the best move of my life coming here to Cavan because it gave me the opportunity to work, meet people.

“Just everything, life, it’s calmer here.”

“Every day for me is a good day.”