A two-time All-Ireland hurling winner with Tipperary, Patrick "Bonner" Maher knows a thing or two about pressure.
Despite coming agonisingly close to reaching a second successive All-Ireland final against Galway, Maher admits that 2017 is a year Tipperary just want to move beyond.
Brendan Maher revealed as much to Balls.ie last month.
Yet, speaking to the Independent from the comfort of an All-Star even in Singapore, Maher gave a good insight into why he can compartmentalise his disappointment so effectively.
Having recently returned from a four month UN peacekeeping mission in a seperation zone between Syria and Israel, failing to win another All-Ireland medal is put in some perspective:
We were interchanging through two different camps, two weeks in Syria, two weeks in Israel.
It was a fairly intense place to step into. Going away from home and all your comforts and being thrown into a place that's in dire conflict was a real experience.
It is not hard to imagine that "Bonner" Maher found it difficult therefore to relate to some of the reported incidents that derailed Tipperary's charge for back-to-back All-Ireland's.
Under intense scrutiny and pressure on their peacekeeping work, Maher reveals how close to actual violence they really were:
The first few weeks there, you're on edge - you're hearing explosions and gunfire. You're in a sort of prefab building and you're sitting there and suddenly the whole place is shaking.
You're thinking, "What am I doing here?"
Yet, it does not take long for this war-zone to take on all the affectations of normality, Maher admits:
You hear an explosion and you're used to it. You'd see lads going around on mopeds with AK-47s on their backs.
You come back with a different concept of what is going on out there.
Although Maher is back now and as determined as ever to add to the two All-Ireland medals he already has won, the commitment required to play inter-county hurling continues to surprise him.
Making the Tipperary dressing-room sound like a military hospital of its own - "Go into any club and ask who had an operation ... half the room will stick up a hand" - he is in no doubt that the end of Kilkenny's supremacy will open the door for others to run in.
One thing is certain however, win or lose, Maher is capable of meeting both fates the same.
