Inside Ryan Tubridy and Clare Kambamettu's love story

Extra.ie​

4 hours ago

Posting a happy selfie on social media that says 'I'm on holidays' can feel as joyful as turning on your out-of-office email. So it's no wonder that Ryan Tubridy was beaming as he took to Instagram a fortnight ago, against a backdrop of Clifden's rugged seascape, to announce that he was taking a break for a couple of weeks.
But what we now know is that it wasn't just general holiday mode that caused Ryan — who presents a weekday talk show on Virgin Radio UK that's simultaneously broadcast on Dublin's Q102 — to break into a smile. This is a man who was putting his annual leave to good use, a man head over heels in love, about to pop the question to his partner of two years, senior clinical psychologist and a former Rose of Tralee winner Dr Clare Kambamettu.
We also know now that Clare said yes — although we didn't hear this from the couple themselves; over the weekend, O'Dalaigh Jewellers jewellery store in Galway posted a photo thanking Ryan for choosing their shop to buy her ring. In a now- deleted post, the jewellers shared that Ryan had come to them 'discreetly' looking for a diamond ring for a 'special lady'. Dr Clare Kambamettu and Ryan Tubridy. Pic: RTÉ
The release of the news wasn't very well co-ordinated, it seems. Well, the course of true love never does run smooth but no matter — on Tuesday Ryan happily formally confirmed their engagement on his radio show, stating he was 'very, very, very happy to confirm I did get engaged to my partner Clare in the west of Ireland on Thursday evening'.
He added: 'It's a very exciting time to be alive. I'm a very, very lucky man, and I think it's one of those beautiful moments where the world feels lighter.'
The stars have clearly aligned for Ryan this year as he went on to describe how his happy news was 'just the accumulation of a lot of lovely things happening, and I just decided now is the time.'
And while the exact place of where Ryan got down on one knee has not been revealed, we know it was somewhere in the West of Ireland. This part of the country is a place close to his heart – his cousin owns the popular Abbeyglen Castle Hotel in Clifden in Connemara. Ryan Tubridy. Pic: Nick Edwards
In fact this was the location of his proposal to his first wife and mother of his two daughters, Anne Marie Power.
But amid Ryan's happiness in sharing his engagement, a little disclaimer: 'more to follow in terms of details and all the rest of it. And by the more to follow, I mean I'll tell my family first,' — a warning, perhaps, to any parties who may be involved in planning their upcoming nuptials.
For despite Ryan's very public persona, his desire for privacy in his personal life is reflected in loved up pair's relationship, which has been mostly kept under wraps since they got together in 2023.
How exactly the love birds met is unknown, but Clare appeared as a guest on his RTE radio show just days before he announced he was stepping down from the Late Late Show and a few months before he effectively became a posterboy for the RTÉ payments scandal (more of that later). Clare Kambamettu and Ryan Tubridy. Pic:Listening back to that radio interview on March 8 2023, it's clear that the chemistry between the pair was sizzling over the airwaves. The topic was the phenomenon of manifesting and Clare, as a clinical psychologist, was opining on whether there was real psychological science behind it. It was an intense, almost 20 minute deep-dive into nature, connection, and tellingly, the matters of the heart.
Ryan, who admitted he was already familiar with Clare, as a host may have even been a little tongue-tied, as he interviewed her in person in the studio (there's still a picture of the pair smiling happily together post-chat on the RTE web archive).
He stumbled over the pronunciation of her surname and a little like a first date (albeit shared to the country), they got to know a little more about each other.
Ryan told Clare how he was fascinated with psychiatry, as it was his father's profession, and simultaneously she revealed some insight into her own family, from growing up on a farm in Athy and even how her Indian-born father, a doctor, met her physiotherapist mother 'at the foot of a bed in Merlin Park hospital in the 70s' and was introduced as Dr Ravishing, which Ryan had a giggle at. Clare Kambamettu and Ryan Tubridy. Pic:for The Irish Post
He was clearly wanting to impress his psychologist guest by sharing his latest reading material — psychologist, philosopher, and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl's existential masterpiece, Man's Search for Meaning, with both of them agreeing that they found it mind-blowing.
Clare spoke of finding perspective when we are suffering — 'a purpose through love and when we are caring for one another' —which would prove to be prescient words given her calming presence in the storm of Ryan's life a few months later.
The only small blip in the conversation was when Ryan — prompted by the influx of texts to the show — asked Clare if she had ever been crowned Rose of Tralee.
Clare briefly answered that she was and Ryan cheekily asked her had she got over it, to which she replied jokingly (but firmly shutting down the topic) 'just about, still getting over it'. Clare Kambamettu. Pic: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photos
Ryan ended the chat with a reluctant 'We could go on — I really enjoyed that conversation,' and this sentiment was shared by Clare with a softly spoken 'Me too.'
Days later, he announced he was stepping down from the Late Late Show, and what followed an implosion of Ryan's life, or what he has described as so visceral, it was akin to a 'mugging'.
In June 2023, RTÉ announced that between 2017 and 2022 it had paid €345,000 more than had been previously disclosed to the TV and radio presenter, whose pay was already known to be more than that of anyone else at RTÉ — causing a public outcry and backlash against him as the public broadcaster imploded, leading to him losing his lucrative radio gig.
Speaking on the Laughs Of Your Life podcast in December 2023, Ryan told Doireann Garrihy that although he was 'trashed' at the time, the scandal was 'arguably the best thing that ever happened' to him, due to his subsequent employment with Virgin Radio in London, and no doubt, the new supportive love of Clare.
Tubridy said: 'Blessings come in strange disguises and that's what happened because arguably the best thing that ever happened to me was what happened to me.
'I always wanted to go to London. I always wanted to investigate radio over there and TV but I never did it. I was thinking about it but I was procrastinating.
'I was 'maybe somedaying' my life away until I was mugged – and it was the best mugging a man could get,' he continued. 'Because once the dark clouds dissipated – and they did, they're still dissipating a little bit to be honest – but once they started to make way for decision-making and purposeful planning, everything started to happen.'
It's possible he took Clare's advice on manifesting with action and applied it to his own life, because if Ryan was down in the summer of 2023, some mere months later, his life had taken a complete turnaround.
While he took a significant drop in salary from his previous six-sum role — his salary at Virgin Radio is reported to be between £50,000 and £80,000 (€57,550 to €92,000) — he is carving out a whole new career in London, a city with notably more opportunities in media, in a move which has seen him swapping his posh pad in Monkstown for a nice little flat near Abbey Road.
He's also hosting a successful podcast, The Bookshelf with Ryan Tubridy, which is sponsored by Eason, and sees him sit down with household names to discuss what books greatly influenced their lives.
He is a weekly columnist with the Irish Mail on Sunday where he shares details about his new London life.
And in the wings through it all has been Clare. The pair were spotted jogging in Dun Laoghaire and also together in the West of Ireland, where Ryan retreated after he was taken off the airwaves that June. Then they made their first red carpet appearance as a couple at the Irish Post Awards in London in November 2023, where they were pictured partying with singers Una Healy and Imelda May after he presented an award to Nadine Coyle.
They've also been pictured at a Rose Of Tralee event with Ryan's ex Aoibhinn Ní Shúilleabháin, the couple shook it off at one of Taylor Swift's Eras Tour concerts in Dublin in 2024 and Ryan happily cuddled up to his girlfriend at the opening of an alcohol company he has invested in, Muff Liquor, last summer too.
Speaking to a publication soon after he made his big move to London, he revealed that Clare — whose Master's degree in Mental Health is from King's College — was also the person who was helping him settle into a new city.
'She's all over this. I don't need Chris Evans to show me around. Yeah, she's got this covered. She's wonderful,' he said, adding that their relationship h was 'one of the more lovely beacons in a sea of doubt'.
'If I can be a master of understatement here, I'll say that the last few months have been intense and I was lucky here and there – and Clare was certainly one of those lucky moments,' he said.
And in another interview, when asked if Clare had been a major support amid the RTÉ payments scandal, he replied: 'Remarkably so.'
Though he guards his private life, Ryan has had his share of heartbreak. He was married to producer Ann-Marie Power from 2003 until they separated in 2006, having previously told how he first met her in 1997 when he spotted her in a recording studio in RTÉ.
'She was going in to make a programme, I was going out. My head turned and my life changed. I pursued her relentlessly,' he shared. Ryan and Ann-Marie had two daughters together, Ella and Julia, who are now 26 and 19. Ryan clearly has a great relationship with his children, previously describing them as 'the least demanding young women you've ever met — they are beautiful souls'.
Ryan went on to date Irish academic Aoibhinn Ní Shúilleabháin, another previous Rose of Tralee, following her appearance on his Saturday night chat show, Tubridy Tonight, in March 2009. Ryan reportedly asked her out after the show, in the RTÉ green room.
In the week approaching his debut as host of The Late Late Show, he told a publication that Ní Shúilleabháin was a 'great support' and had transformed his life. In 2010 he also referred to Aoibhinn as his 'rock' since the death of friend and colleague Gerry Ryan.
Speaking to the RTE Guide about his life off air in September 2008, Ryan was pretty specific about what type of woman he likes — and it's not just former Roses.
'I like intelligence, I like a good conversation. I like elegance, I like a girl who is feminine without being vain… also love a girl who appreciates darkness. I'm a lot darker than people think — plenty of dark humour,' he declared.
However, after four years together, Aoibhinn and Ryan went their separate ways, with Aoibhinn marrying husband Carlos Diaz in 2017, and the couple are now parents to three children.
Not much is known about Clare's former flames, but we know a little more about the background and professional life of the Leeds-born beauty, who moved to Athy with her family at the age of eight.
She was educated at Scoil Mhuire, Athy and University College Galway, before studying in London and was working for the NHS when she entered the Rose of Tralee competition as the London Rose at the age of 26.
Both Ryan and Clare have links to London and Galway — Clare returned to NUIG to complete her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology, and after years of working across the gamut of mental health services, including in adult and forensic mental health and is now a psychologist in the HSE's Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services.
There are many strings to her bow — and in Ryan's field of expertise too, as Clare was also at one time a presenter of RTÉ One's Eco Eye, a programme fronted by Duncan Stewart which brought to light ecological issues and how they are impacting society.
And as part of her reign as Rose of Tralee she travelled to India with her mother, Breda, and her father, Ravi, to take part in a documentary about the Voluntary Services Overseas' charity work.
In an interview back in April 2011, she enthused about how much she enjoyed her time as a Rose and the opportunities it afforded her, musing that had she not done it, she would never had got the chance to 'shake Obama's hand' or 'meet [Irish president] Mary McAleese'.
And now, with Ryan at her side and Clare by his it's likely this power couple can manifest anything and everything together.