Mandi Millar reports
IF you didn’t know better you’d swear sportswoman Emma McQuaid’s abs were drawn on!
Yet despite her diminutive 5’5” stature, this Newry athlete is a Titan in the world of sport.
Ireland’s fittest woman eight years in a row, she was the first from her country to qualify for the world-stage CrossFit Games, repeating the feat for six consecutive years to 2024.
“Achieving that is massive in this sport,” says Emma, who’s also been one of the UK’s top 10 quad bike racers, not to mention Ireland’s highest ever international weightlifter after competing at the Commonwealth Games.
That unprecedented pedigree across multiple disciplines was recently recognised by the Irish Motorbike Awards, who named her Trailblazer of the Year.
And aged 36 there’s no sign of her slowing down either.
“I love to see what’s possible and I still don’t know what that is. I love to push my body and mind to the limit to see how high I can reach. Every year I’ve done something crazy that I never thought was possible!” says Emma, who this season returned to the world of quad bike racing after a 13-year hiatus.
The move follows a devastating CrossFit wrist injury in 2024. But where anyone else might’ve taken time out, Emma decided instead to re-visit the sport she took up aged just six, racing until she was 24.
Even then she only hung up her boots after fellow rider, her then partner now husband, David Wray, was left paralysed from a horrific accident.
Her brother had already broken his back in a racing accident though it wasn’t until David’s crash that she stepped back from the sport she’d lived and breathed from childhood.
The middle of three siblings, both she and her brother raced quads, supported by parents Sonya and John.
“Now that David and I have to fund things ourselves we realise the sacrifices they must’ve made, especially when dad was out of work for 18 months during those years after injuring his back,” reflects Emma, who got her first electric quad when little more than a toddler.
“I think that’s where it all stemmed from for my mum and dad aren’t adrenalin junkies,” laughs Emma, who even as a youngster was always super competitive.
“At school I was that child, the full psycho. If I didn’t win everything on sports day, it was the end of the world!
“I joined everything I could – cross country, netball, sprint, Gaelic, badminton, whatever was going – and even from primary school I knew sport would be my career.
“I scraped through my GCSEs with Cs, except PE where I got an A which tells you everything you need to know really!”
At 18, Emma went straight into personal training alongside competing nationally and internationally on quad bike circuits where she met David.
“We were just a couple of immature young people racing all over the world doing what we loved, no mortgage, no debts but that changed overnight and we had to grow up fast following David’s accident in 2012,” recalls Emma, who had been planning to turn professional the next year having just won her first ever pro women’s event in Nashville.
“Five days later though David had his accident, hitting a bump in the road which catapulted the bike. It caught him in the back, irreparably damaging the spinal cord. He was the best in the country at the time.”
It forced Emma to fundamentally re-think her options.
“David would never have stopped me racing but I knew he found it hard to watch me after that so I was happy enough to step back and just find something else to be good at!” laughs Emma, who subsequently converted the garage of their home to a gym and became a self-employed PT so she could be there for David, too.
Indeed it was during a trip to the States where he was receiving rehab that she first experienced CrossFit.
“I was in the gym doing normal squats and stuff but in the corner I could see people doing butterfly pull-ups and overhead squats.
“It looked great and I thought it would be a great accompaniment to my quad training.
“Then I just got really good at it,” jokes Emma, explaining that CrossFit encompasses a range of disciplines from running to kayaking, swimming to gymnastics, weightlifting to cycling… and more.
However, when that horrific wrist injury meant she couldn’t compete this year Emma decided to return to her quad racing roots instead.
“I took head staggers but it ended up a very successful year with a podium finish in a pro women’s championship!” says Emma, who works with other aspiring athletes from her 3,000sq ft purpose-built professional gym and now wants to give something back to sport.
“I love working with people who want to achieve greatness and in working with kids it’s about helping them to become athletes, for a lot of people think when you’re driving or riding especially you don’t have to worry about sleep, nutrition and training yet it’s vital.
“I’ve already got my Motorcycle Racing Association coaching license for Ireland and I’m now working towards a European licence so hopefully I can open up even more opportunities for young people.
“We’re adrenalin junkies in NI with some of the fastest racers in the world. We want to keep it that way, especially on the quad racing circuits where young people in NI have no real mentor at the moment.”
It’s a role Emma is ready to fill… yet beyond that, what’s left for her to do when she’s achieved so much already?
“Oh there’s always places left to go!” she laughs – and with abs like hers you don’t argue!
