Every boxer has their own cautionary tale about the perils of cutting weight too abruptly. For Lisa O’Rourke the damaging repercussions were twofold, and a long spell out of the ring wasn’t necessarily the least of them.O’Rourke was in the final rounds of a sparring contest last December when by her own admission she landed an “awful” punch, breaking a metacarpal in her right hand. Worse still, it was a rebreak of the same bone, which meant surgery was required to ensure proper healing this time around.As a light middleweight, O’Rourke could normally tip the scales up to 70kg and the problem was traced back to a weakened spot in the bone when she was trying to cut to 66kg, back in October 2023, but without giving her body the fuel and nutrients it needed to fully recover.“I was making 66kg at the time, a lighter weight, and it probably wasn’t being natural for me,” O’Rourke says. “I’m a big girl, and I like my food. To be honest, I just think it was a weakened spot, never really gave it its best nutrition. And it’s definitely one thing I’ve learned that food is fuel, like getting enough protein, and to rehydrate, refuel and repair your body after every session.“And I’ve learned it the hard way. Maybe it’s a thing because it’s boxing, you’re conscious of the weight. But it’s definitely something I’ve learned, that you need to feed your body or else you won’t go anywhere.”The required surgery meant several months out of the ring, although for O’Rourke, the perhaps more pressing repercussion was that it was just three days before her older sister Aisling was getting married – a special day out for the family from Castlerea in Roscommon.“So yeah, I was walking down the aisle with a cast on me,” she says. “There are five girls in the house, so herself, and four sisters, all of us bridesmaids. The first family wedding for us, so it was a big day. I made do with it, though, it was grand.”It had already been a year of mixed fortunes for O’Rourke. In March 2025, in Nis, Serbia, she made the light middleweight final at the IBA Women’s World Boxing Championships, with her older sister Aoife also making the middleweight final (75kg).They were the first sisters in boxing history to make finals in the same tournament. Unfortunately, they both lost to Russian opponents, though each still came away with $50,000 (€43,275) in prize money.Lisa O'Rourke celebrates winning a gold medal at the 2022 IBA Women's World Boxing Championships in Istanbul. Photograph: Aleksandar Djorovic/©INPHO Last June, Lisa competed alongside Aoife in the World Hyrox Championships in Chicago, winning the gold medal in the doubles event, which involved various running and weight-bearing workouts.Then at the inaugural World Boxing Championships in Liverpool last September, organised by the new World Boxing federation, Lisa just missed out on another medal when losing her quarter-final bout to top-seed Lekeisha Pergoliti from Australia.Later in the week, Aoife went on to win the middleweight gold, meaning there were two world champions in the O’Rourke family, after Lisa previously won light middleweight gold in Istanbul in 2022.“To be honest, that was probably one of the top memories of my sporting career so far, being in a world final with your sister,” she says of her Serbian experience back in March. “We wouldn’t have wrote it, I don’t think. Going into that fight, yes, we wanted the gold medal but just being there alone was special.“Then in Liverpool, it was tough. It would have been nice to try and get on a bit further in the competition, but I’m sure I’ll meet that girl again, and if I do, I’ll hopefully be a better Lisa.”[ James Lowe confirms he will leave Leinster at end of seasonOpens in new window ]Both sisters (Lisa, 24, and Aoife, 28), have long-term aims of qualification for the LA Olympics. After missing the National Championships in January, Lisa isn’t yet guaranteed a spot at the European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria, in September.“I’m just trying to strengthen it up fully,” she says of the injury. “It could be worse timing, I’d rather get it all right, and then hopefully it’ll stay quiet.“The girl [Evelyn Igharo, who won the national title] that is competing at my weight at the moment is entitled to go technically [to the Europeans].“When I had this bit of a setback, and her coming in, it really has been one of the best things ever. Because I haven’t had someone on my tail up until this point. And if anything, I think it’s going to make me better. So it just shows you that the standard is getting really high in Ireland for women’s boxing, it’s great to see it.”– Lisa O’Rourke was speaking in her role as an ambassador for the National Diary Council partnership with the Sport Ireland Institute.