As another year of 'Run with Ray' takes to the roads this week, broadcaster Ray D’Arcy sits down with Janice Butler to talk about getting the nation moving, his own life goals as he approaches 60 and why giving up alcohol has changed his life.
Looking incredibly fit and healthy, dressed all in black, apart from the grey hair, the Kildare native has barely aged a day since his antics with the wisecracking puppets. The broadcaster, who will be undertaking five ‘Run with Ray’ races in the coming weeks as part of his afternoon RTÉ Radio 1 show,
seems to be hitting a sweet spot in his life.
The work/life balance is finally good, he’s achieving certain dreams ahead of his milestone birthday and
after more than 30 years in the business, he’s very comfortable with who he is as a broadcaster, something we may not have always seen from him in the past when he hosted his often criticised Saturday Night Show.
"You can’t be anyone but yourself in this job because it reveals itself eventually," he replies when I put that to him. Love it or hate it, he’s authentically himself on the airwaves, something we don’t always see in the industry.
"But look, at the end of the day people are people, whether you’re talking to Jeremy Irons or Mary who’s putting on chicken curry for the dinner, it’s all people. When you get to my stage, there’s no pretense,
good, bad or indifferent. And that takes years, it’s about confidence."
"For us as a team, it’s lovely to get out of the studio and be on the road with the Roadcaster; that brings its own energy. You’re a little bit closed off in the campus here so it’s brilliant to get out and meet the people who are listening to you and to just be out in the real world."
But he does remark that it has given pause for reflection on what the national broadcaster is delivering. "I felt angry at the time, and at a human level I felt sorry for the people involved because they all have families and commitments, but I felt very angry," he says.
How does he feel about his salary constantly being a topic for discussion?
He says he’s never been shy of hard work and he and the team on his show are always looking at what they can do to add to the quality of their offering. "We have to be different to the rest of the line-up in the schedule – we would have done a lot more serious stuff in Today FM, and that changed in here and that’s something I think about on a regular basis. But there’s a mix and we get to do some really interesting things," he says, going on to pick a recent highlight of his.
Away from work, the family man, who has two kids (Kate, 17 and Tom, 11) with wife Jenny Kelly, is lling his spare time with tness and music. He runs every morning in UCD with his Golden Retriever Stanley, before
the family wakes – it’s for both body and mind and gives a routine he craves in his day.
"It’s routine for me. I need to do it. It’s a lovely time of the day and there’s a lovely community up there, everyone acknowledges each other," he says. "There was a stage where I’d only go once or twice a week and I was feeling stale. ere were other things going on at the time, when I was on TV, I was working far too much, it was ridiculous. Some weeks it was 60 or 70 hours a week; it wasn’t healthy but we’re out the other side now," he reflects.
Another big life change the broadcaster made was giving up alcohol in recent years. While he says he never had an issue with drink, he made the decision one day while out on a run and hasn’t looked back since. "I gave up drink four years ago and it’s changed my life," he says.
"I didn’t drink that much. Jenny gave up drinking six years ago and the kids would say. "Daddy, why don’t you?" and I thought well, I just have the odd glass of wine on a Friday evening, I don’t drink enough to give it up," he adds.
"One day I was on holidays down the country, I’d had a few glasses of wine and the next day, out on a run, I felt a bit fuzzy, and I just thought, I’m going to give this up. ere was no big deal about it, I hadn’t discussed it with anybody, I just decided it was something I was going to do. I suppose I was inspired by Jenny and seeing how much it changed her life," he says of his decision.
"Not to sound up my behind, but I feel lucky that I don’t drink. It’s the even keel and you get so much more out of the weekends. Some people might think that’s very boring, but I nd it very attractive."
He plays down his impending roundy birthday. Will there be any big celebrations? "Oh I don’t know," he laughs, and admits to being low-key about everything.
"Well, when I was 40, I said I was going to learn to swim, which I did, and I did the triathlon just before my 40th birthday. So, for this one, I’m learning how to play the drums. I can half play ve songs, so far," he says of his new passion.
Why the drums I ask?
"My dad was a drummer so that might be part of it, and I suppose from doing the DJing, I felt I had a bit of an in," he answers, referring to when he worked as a DJ in his teens to make a few bob.
He’s in the process of mastering Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit and Charles Wright’s Express Yourself. He uses it to be fully present in something and for all-important bonding time with his son, Tom, who can
play the bass and is dabbling in the drums with his dad.
"I can’t describe what it’s like," he says of that time with Tom. "He was on to me to get the drums and I was putting it o . He was learning the bass and was keen to do the drums too, so I used him as an excuse. It’s very, very special to enjoy it with him. It’s those little things that mean the most."
Is his new decade a cause for reflection?
"I don’t think so, I don’t feel 60," he laughs. "I remember in my 40s telling the physio that I wanted to be able to run in my 60s and she laughed at me and said there’s no certainty in life. But I can still run, so I just want to keep doing what I’m doing."
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