"Why Eddie Irvine's my best mate" 23.03.07

STUNNING local model Michelle Doherty was this week enjoying a much-needed break with her mum and dad in picturesque Malin. Michelle, 30, who has a hectic TV and modelling career in Dublin, was at home in Donegal to host the Letterkenny Fashion Event at the Clanree Hotel last night in aid of the children of Belarus.
	As the presenter of 'Night Shift', the alternative music show on Channel Six, she is on screen seven nights a week and two afternoons at the weekend. She is also a model with Morgan modelling agency and, being best mates with former Formula 1 ace Eddie Irvine, her social life can get a bit hectic too. “I’m so busy at the moment with 'Night Shift,” she told InishowenNews.com. I do nine shows a week so it’s tough going.” The second eldest child of Ann and Sean Doherty of Ballysalla, Glengad, Malin, Michelle got her break while working in Dublin as an air stewardess with Aer Lingus.
“I’m a friend of Derry designer Jen Kelly. One Christmas in the late 1990s, he took me to a Christmas party for the photographer Barry McCall. Barry said to Jen ‘I’d love to a shoot with your friend’ and the rest, as they say, is history.” These days, the former Carn Community School pupil has to dodge the Dublin paparazzi, keen to get the low-down on her love life.

But the down-to-earth local girl tells us there’s no-one special in her life right now. She’s happy enough, however, to talk about one of her best friends, Eddie Irvine. “Eddie and me met through friends in the late 1990s in Dublin and have been best buddies ever since. Eddie sometimes gets a bad press and people think he’s a bit arrogant and full of himself, but he’s very genuine, very honest and straight to the point. I’m like that too, so I think that’s one of the reasons we get on so well.
“You couldn’t get a better friend than Eddie. He would do anything for me. If I needed something or wanted a bit of advice, he would be there for me. That’s what friends are for.” When their schedules allow, Michelle and Eddie, who is mainly a property investor these days, meet up in Dublin. When she gets a chance, she flies over to see him in whatever part of the world has taken his fancy. “You could find Eddie anywhere in the world – New York or Miami – who knows?” she laughs. And she might even get him to sail his yacht to Glengad one of these days too.
Return to > News