I'd had 35 professional fights and mentally I was tired of it. I'd sort ot fallen out of love with the sport.

I wanted to bring people together, and most importantly not feel threatened when they came to watch me box.

If somebody had told me in the 1980s that Gerry Adams would shake hands with Ian Paisley or Peter Robinson I would have said put that man in a white suit and lock him up in a padded cell.

I train very hard, either rowing on the cross trainer or running. Not only do you feel tired afterwards but it relaxes you, it completely clears the head. But to sort things out I also like to walk.

I don't want to sound obnoxious, but I like to think I brought it another step. I was able to bring people who were casually interested in boxing together.

The trouble with boxing is that too often it ends in sadness.

I get people to this day - I won my title 25 years ago - saying how wonderful a time they had during that dark period in our history when they came to watch me fight.