The French lightweight, now an unbeaten professional and a likely future opponent of Katie Taylor, caused a major upset at the 2016 championships in Astana when she ended Taylor’s 10-year reign as World champion.

Harrington won a silver medal in the light welterweight category at those championships which secured her funding. It was the first step on a long journey.

She remembers Irish coach John Conlan was in her corner for the spar.

“I was like, right sure, I’ll give it a bash and see what happens. That’s when it happened. That’s when the penny dropped. Before that it was just going through the motions because apart from club coaches and stuff some people didn’t have confidence in me.

“Once I got confidence in myself and got a bit of backing behind me this is what happens. When club coaches and high-performance coaches come together and come up with solutions and not problems this is what happens.”

Of course, it wasn’t a linear journey from that moment in Astana to the Kokugikan Arena in Tokyo yesterday when she became both the third Irish female and the third Irish boxer to win an Olympic gold medal.

She broke her right thumb twice in 2019.

“I broke it in the elites (Irish championship), fixed it, went to the European Games, broke it again. I thought that was it like. But I was doing plenty of yoga trying to keep my head together and it was alright.

“Then bang – Covid.

“It was probably the best thing that happened for me because it gave me time to get ready, to prepare. That’s all I needed was time, so it was probably a blessing for me. I know that’s not a good thing to say but . . .”

Even though there probably isn’t a more inspirational Irish person right now than the 31-year old from Portland Row, she finds it hard to get her head around the role model idea.

“I can’t believe that I inspire anybody. That’s the hard thing to get my head around. But I know I am in the limelight and I know I have to be a role model.

“I just want to be the best version of me that I can be so that I can inspire kids and be a good role model for kids. I want them to bring out the best version of themselves and they don’t have to be Irish champion, World champion, Olympic champion.

“They don’t have to be anything only a better version of themselves and if I can do that, I’ll be happy. For me I love giving and if I can give someone a little bit of inspiration, a little bit of get-up and go that means the world to me.”

She is momentarily speechless when it is pointed out to her after she is following in the footsteps of Michelle Smith and Katie Taylor – who was once her team-mate – as Ireland’s only female Olympic gold medallists.

“I don’t know. It’s a good feeling.”

And, then her sense of humour surfaces as she breaks into song.

“I gotta feeling . . .”

She insists that other Irish female boxers are going to emulate her achievements at future Olympic Games.

“There is going to be more history after me because we have plenty of fantastic female boxers coming through the ranks. And I know we have had a rough year and a lot of the clubs have been shut and stuff.

“I just want to say to all those kids and teenagers out there ‘get back in’. You might have missed the year, but you can take it back like that,” she stressed.

“You might be unfit, but you will never lose the skills that you have. So get back in at it, start small and work on it.”

It was Irish coach Conlan, a fellow Dub and a father, who has worked with her since she joined the High-Performance Unit five years ago who best captured the essential Kellie Harrington.

“She’s just a great human being. I asked the other day ‘what is the best version of yourself?’ and she said, ‘someone who gives and shares’ and that’s her in a nutshell. She gives everything in training.

“She wants to succeed; she says she doesn’t, but she does want to succeed. But then she’ll go back and do a night shift in the hospital.

“She’s amazing. She’s a great human being and it’s well deserved. The fact she doesn’t believe it makes it even better. She was brilliant,” he added.