GAA legend Mickey still Whelan in the years coaching at 85
Whelan is also the President of St Vincent's. That's usually a ceremonial role, an honour passed on to a veteran who is expected to do little more than sit at the top table at the annual dinner dance. Whelan couldn't be more different.
It's only a short stroll from Mickey Whelan's home in Marino to Parnell Park in Donnycarney. So much of Whelan's life has been wrapped up in that field on the northside of Dublin.
Today, he'll be back there with the St Vincent's senior hurlers for their club championship date with Craobh Chiaráin, Pat Gilroy is the Vincent's manager, Whelan is his coach. That was the case when the Dublin footballers won their first All-Ireland in 16 years in 2011 too.
But Whelan was a young man of 72 back then... Now he's 85 and still coaching a senior club team - one that only lost in last year's championship to the eventual winners, Ballyboden St Enda's, by two points in the semi-finals.
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Whelan and Gilroy were in place back then and the older man pauses when asked for the last year that he didn't coach a team.
He won Sam Maguire with Dublin in 1963 at 24, and he was coaching from his early 20s, so...he pauses again.
Right, he's decided to win backwards. Last couple of years with Gilroy and the Vins' hurlers - "Pat wouldn't cross the road without me."
Then there was a stint with the senior camogie team in the club. Various underage teams in hurling and football.
Two years - with Gilroy, of course - with the Dublin hurlers.
Before that? Various teams in Vincent's after finishing up with Dublin in 2011.
Whelan looks at me - ''do you really want me to keep going?''
There's a smile, a smile that is never far away with Whelan.
"I started coaching in my early 20s and I've been doing it ever since." So we can take it that you have to go back over 60 years for a year without Whelan on the training ground.
It's a remarkable run. Is there another 80something coach in the country in any sport? Is there another All-Ireland winner from the 1960s still actively involved in sport?
Whelan is also the President of St Vincent's. That's usually a ceremonial role, an honour passed on to a veteran who is expected to do little more than sit at the top table at the annual dinner dance. Whelan couldn't be more different.
During our conversation, he gets most animated when talking about the Vincent's hurlers' defeat to 'Boden last year.
"I wasn't at the game, I was thousands of miles away, getting a Hall of Fame award for soccer in the States. They're always giving me those bloody thingtims..."
As well as being inducted into the GAA's Hall of Fame, Whelan has been inducted into four different Halls of Fame in US soccer.
"I had to see the game so I watched it online. Ah, it was a hard defeat to take. A draw and then extra-time. Two points down in the last minute of extra-time and we got a penalty,'' he said.
"Tom Connolly took it and the 'keeper pushed the sliotar on to the post and out it came. It was the last puck of the match. A hard one to take."
When St Vincent's footballers won their first Dublin championship since 1984 in 2007, Whelan was manager. Who was the manager when they'd won in '84? Do you really need to ask?
Back then, Whelan was 55, but still able to get through to players more than 30 years younger than him. Now he's dealing with players who can be up to 65 years his junior. So where did that passion for coaching originate?
“I honestly don’t know where it comes from. It’s just something in me and I get a great deal of satisfaction from working with young people,’’ he said.
“I probably benefit from it too. It keeps me active and keeps me involved. Kevin Heffernan was the same. He was 10 years older than me and he was taking Under-16 teams on late in life.''
It was advice from Heffernan that led to Whelan giving up his job as a fitter and taking the brave decision to bring his wife and two kids to the US at the age of 30 to study.
Whelan took degrees in social science, biology, health and physical education and a masters in sports science. To make ends meet, himself and his wife took on part-time cleaning jobs. To Whelan, that was pressure. Team management is just play.
He went on to lecture in sports science in DCU and agrees with the assessment that his American experience has really stood to him.
“What it really did was it confirmed things that I knew intuitively. The science was there to back it up that all these physiological parameters can be achieved by using the ball,’’ he said.
“Certainly, in under-age stuff, we’re wasting time working on physical fitness. We’re wasting a great opportunity to work on motor skills.”
Whelan, in many ways, is a purist, preaching the gospel of attacking football and he has never been afraid to learn from other sports.
“I have European coaching badges in soccer and worked with the Ireland Under-15 and Under-16 teams and I also coached Dundalk when they won the League under Dermot Keely,’’ he said.
“I’m a firm believer that if you can’t play good football, you’re going to find it difficult to win.
“You have to be prepared to take the risk of losing possession or the odd game in order to build the overall style of play.
“A lof of people have the ability in training but they can’t transfer it to the training field. The pressure gets to them.
"The new generation have different problems to deal with. The pressures at work and even at college. We have to be cognisant of that."
Among his many degrees is PhDs, but he doesn't call himself Dr Mickey Whelan.
"Why do I have to? I got it done. I did it, and that's it.'' That's the Whelan way.
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