Daniel Hooker - Blog

I started on my Paralympic journey as a sprinter. The 100m is the big glamorous event of athletics and I wanted to be a part of it. And to be fair, I’m not too bad – 19th in the World at time of writing. But it’s based on my acceleration. So my greater potential is probably in the long jump where run ups rarely exceed 20 strides (mine is presently 16). And it was the event I knew was my real chance this year.

I’m temperamentally more suited to a field event. Because you’re not competing with others directly it’s naturally more introspective and its greater technical demands make it more of a cerebral challenge. Above all I feel less tension clouding my competition plan, if you screw up first time they give you another go – five of them in fact. And all that counts is one big jump.

I found one at Loughborough in the middle of June. The first two jumps were poor, but the third one just clicked. I went out to 4.97m. A big personal best, 13cm short of the A Standard and 27cm short of the eighth place in the World Rankings that UK Athletics were demanding as a minimum for selection. And I landed on my backside, with 15-20cm lost by the fraction of a second it landed before my heels. It was well and truly game on.

I produced an even better jump at Accrington ten days later. You can generally tell as a long jumper how far you went – a combination of air time and angle of take off gives it away – and this was well over the A Standard, maybe 5.20m. Unfortunately my foot was 5cm over the board at take off. Red flag. Foul. No Jump. Even worse I’d moved my run-up in 10cm on that jump to account for a change in the wind. And I rarely foul - this was my only one in my last 20 jumps.

So it all came down to one competition at Birmingham. Buoyed by a personal best in the 100m I jumped well, registering my second, third and fourth best jumps ever, all within 8cm of that 4.97 personal best. But it’s all about that one big jump and I just couldn’t find it. Gutting not to get the A Standard.

Inevitably, after five years of work where so many things happen there is a mixture of emotions. Of course it hurt seeing the 2012 team without my name on it but the truth is I wasn’t good enough. That’s the beauty of athletics – it’s objective and measurable. In some ways it is a relief. It distorts how you view your performance. For example I won my first ever overseas competition at the Dutch Open last month with a big last round jump to edge out the Dutch and Belgian number ones. It was a display of real guts to find a win after a poor start to the competition. But because I was short of the A Standard I was furious about it for days. It still annoys me to think of it. Sometimes I feel past it at 20. There’s an 18 year old Brit in my category going to the Games who I was beating easily at 100m two years ago.

But more often that Paralympic Flame still burns inside me. I’ve learnt so much, I know why I didn’t make it. It wasn’t a marginal foul at Accrington or a bad landing at Loughborough. It was indecisiveness – not taking up long jump soon enough when I knew I would be better at it (one more year at it would have made all the difference), not switching coaches when I knew it was necessary, not thinking hard enough about my training.

I’ve got a clear plan for the next four years which I don’t intend to sway from. When I became Oxford Men’s Captain in May I sent an e-mail telling everyone the Monday after Varsity that the preparation for the next one began that day. My drive for Rio has already begun.

After my last blog, I guess the only place to start is with my race in the Olympic Stadium. The pride I felt walking into the Olympic Park as British Number 1 in two events (immediately down to one the following day!) reminded me how much I’ve achieved even if I don’t make the Games.

I guess most people dream of competing on a big stage like that, be it in sport, music or the theatre, but in reality it’s no different to a small arena. Occasionally I’d look up and see this giant stadium structure and remember where I was, but I was focused on warming up and the usual technical concerns like setting up the blocks properly and practice starts. In the 100m you have to focus immediately because you can lose the race in the first stride, so there is no time to admire the stadium.

Having said that, once I’d finished and had time to watch the rest of the competition as a spectator I was able to appreciate this great venue. It seats 80,000 but doesn’t feel as big as other stadiums of a similar size. This will improve the atmosphere because once the stadium is full the crowd and the athletes will feel closer and feed off each other’s emotions. There’s little wind in the stadium and the track is hard and fast, so you get full value for your performance. I must also say a word for the volunteers. Maybe it was because I had athlete’s accreditation but everyone was keen to help and wish me luck. It certainly made me feel like I was part of something special.

My quest to return is unfortunately not going particularly well. I only managed 13.16 seconds, not even a B Standard. I handle big occasions well because they give me the feeling of having made it, so I feel less pressure than normal. Thus I got a cracking start, helped by being towed along by new World Record Holder Graeme Ballard, but as athletes passed me at 60m I tightened up horribly. It was so frustrating because they ran close to the A Standard and I could have been there with them had I stayed calm.

My latest race at Knowsley in Liverpool, the fastest track I’ve ever raced on, gave me the feeling of playing Whack-a-Mole at the Arcades. Whack one problem on the head and another emerges. In London I was too tight past halfway but was ahead after a good drive phase. In Liverpool I was two metres behind rivals I usually lead at halfway after a poor start, held them when they usually go away from me, and could have caught them but was too relaxed. Getting the right mental approach of controlled aggression is the key and I haven’t quite cracked it yet: it’s either too much control or too much aggression.

June represents make-or-break. There will be three competitions, all including the Long Jump which is my best chance of qualification. Either way, I now know what it’s like to experience being on the playing surface of a major stadium, having seen it from the stands so many times. Having played it down earlier in this blog, it does give you a feeling of having achieved something special in your great sporting passion, and being part of an event that really matters.

The competition period is a strange time for athletes. The comfortable routines of the winter have to be cast aside because, for example, you can’t do a heavy weight session one day and then take part in a race the following day. I love routine so its absence is a challenge.

So is keeping a level head. However important a competition is, during this next three months of qualification there’s always another one within three weeks so I can’t let my emotions carry away my focus.

My first competition came a few weeks ago in Grantham. A new venue for me, and one I’m looking forward to going back to. Although the tail wind was slightly illegal, meaning my time couldn’t be recorded for official purposes, I equalled my quickest ever time of 12.83 seconds. This means I am more than halfway to the Global A Standard. This is extremely rare in an opening race as it takes a few races to get used to race intensity. Even better, I beat Michael Churm, a former Paralympic silver medallist. He’s been the top Brit in the T37 category for years. I’m the first Brit to beat him in more than a decade – so it was a huge win. Normally I lead at the start, and he passes me in the second half of the race, but this time I stayed strong. My form lasted until 80m rather than 50m, and held him at arm’s length.

This result was even more impressive given that I had suffered the first onset of a gastric virus the night before. Unfortunately by the time the long jump arrived in the afternoon I could barely run in. I rely heavily on my speed in the long jump so this resulted in a poor performance. However, despite this I jumped a B Standard within 11cm of my personal best, highlighting the technical improvements I made during the winter.

My second competition was last weekend in Gateshead. I love Gateshead and I normally perform well there but circumstances went against me. I’d spent most of the previous two weeks ill in bed, training only three times. It was also extremely cold: a sprinter’s worst nightmare given the need to move the muscles explosively very quickly. Despite all these excuses a performance of 13.44 seconds in the 100m was just not good enough.

My start, usually my trump card, was atrocious. When you don’t accelerate properly at the start you never reach your top speed. The speed you do reach comes too early in the race so there’s a long deceleration period and you end up running 13.44 seconds. I have already been working intensely (more like angrily) to get it right for next time.

The long jump took place in driving rain and single figure temperatures so I was happy with exactly matching the B Standard of 4.55m. I was barely reaching 4.20m in such conditions last year so there has been an improvement. I don’t have another long jump competition for a month, giving me time to make more improvements and gain confidence.

Nonetheless I do have two 100m races in the next month. The second one is at Knowsley in Liverpool. It’s the fastest track in the country and all the top guys will be there. So if I’m going to produce an A Standard that might be the place to do it. The first one, you ask? Some new track in the East End needs testing out. They call it the Olympic Stadium. This is the big one.

In less than two weeks my final push for 2012 gets underway. It is at this point that mental preparation becomes significant. It is a skill that can be improved through training just like strength, speed or power. I have worked in the past with sports psychologist Gemma McGeary on developing this skill.

I learnt to visualise a race before it happens so that I know how I ought to feel at various times in the race. This makes me more in control at the start and able to react on instinct – which is necessary when I only perform for 12 seconds at a time. Ideally as many different scenarios as possible should be visualised so that you’re ready for anything. I remember a race two years ago where I visualised everything really well except for the one thing that happened – me getting ahead of two GB Paralympians – which was such a surprise that I promptly lost my form!

The ultimate goal of mental training is to perform in what is commonly called ‘the zone.’ Gemma calls it ‘flow’ although I’d love to think I qualified for the term ‘expert induced amnesia.’  In ‘the zone’ you’re entirely on autopilot. I’ve only had it once for an entire race (though I regularly have it for the start and drive phase) and I don’t remember that race. It is a strange phenomenon – an out of body, out of space and time experience while conscious – and I feel privileged to experience it.

My physical preparation has, of course, not been neglected. It was heightened by a 10 day warm weather training camp with the University team – aided by further welcome funding from SportsAid and the SPJers Trust. We trained at the Villareal Sports Complex in Portugal’s Algarve – one of the best athletics facilities in the world – alongside several international squads. Being in such a high quality environment was motivating, and encouraged several personal bests.

Warm weather training allows better speed work to be done with less fear of injuring lukewarm muscles, while also ensuring proper attention is given to drills in warm up and stretching in warm down. Everyone finds these lower intensity exercises easier to do for longer with the sun on your back and other athletes to watch, than on your own in the freezing winter.

I normally don’t like knowing my times in training but fortunately our coach for the trip, Eric Brees, was insistent. I say fortunate because I convincingly beat my 80m personal best in a session where I wasn’t even running flat out. After that run I certainly feel ready for the new season. Bring it on!

My first competition is now less than seven weeks away. There is nothing like several months of hard, well-planned and well-executed training sessions to sustain your belief. In training all that matters is lifting that bar, running that rep or nailing that landing. Those moments when all you feel is getting the technique perfect in that moment, and then the next and the one after that, are (in the words of the great Tina Turner) simply the best.

This period of the year sees a gradual but significant change in the nature of my training. Coaches talk about changing to specific preparation. Firstly, intensity is increased and reps are dropped – I lift more weight less times and run faster less often. Secondly, the style of sessions changes. This is most obvious in long jump training where you actually start preparing your run up and jumping. In the sprints it is more subtle. The spikes now come on in every session and rather than just running reps I start racing reps. I put together the different phases of the race – reaction, drive, transition, top speed, speed endurance – in each run rather than simply running with the same technique at the same speed all the way.

If you wonder why I don’t do that (or indeed train for long jump by jumping a long way) from the start of the winter, the answer is quite simply because it’s knackering. Doing a proper start means expending a lot of energy, and reaching too high a top speed and a long jump take off similarly requires massive energy to overcome gravity and create height. The body couldn’t do it for a whole winter, so the early part is spent building up basic strength and power. Having not done this phase for three years I’d forgotten it’s a different sort of tired to a couple of months back – the muscles aren’t as tight but they feel a lot more fatigued, hence the shorter sessions.

Training at this time of year is a lot more fun than what has gone before, precisely because it’s what I signed up for – running fast and jumping far. Long jumping is especially fun – so much so that I have a bad habit of occasionally forgetting the technical points I’m meant to be working on in favour of just enjoying flying through the air. Especially daft given that those technical points normally involve getting more height so I can spend more time in the air! This period of the year is also better for the ego. You look fast and start racking up the big numbers in the gym which is great for countering the doubts that inevitably creep in as you run out of time to change things before competitions start.

As with all my training I set goals at the start of the winter for what I want to lift at what stage. With another month, and another drop in reps still to go, I have already gone beyond what I was expecting to achieve in several exercises and am ahead of schedule in others. I prefer not to have too many track sessions timed purely because you never run 100 per cent, and a slower time than that would worry me. Nonetheless I can feel that I’m covering the ground faster than before – the legacy of better technique which was confirmed to me by the filming of a recent session. I thought it was better but having it objectively certified removes those race day doubts.

Normally I write these blogs at some point during the last week of the month. This time I decided to wait until the month had finished. Why? Well this is the first time in three seasons that I’ve made it into February still fully fit, and I didn’t want to jinx it by saying so before we were actually in February!

I derive confidence from the realisation that at this point last year I was moping about at home, while this year I’m still achieving personal bests in the gym and increasing speed on the track. People talk about mental preparation but 90 per cent of the sport is physical and technical. If you’re not in shape you can’t run as if you are simply by being in a good mental place. Whereas if you have speed in your legs a bad mentality will only slow you down a little. At the elite level one per cent, never mind 10 per cent, makes a massive difference.

While the last year of the Paralympic cycle certainly brings the pressure to its highest point, it has fantastic rewards to compensate: especially on the disabled side, where World and Regional Championships are less well hyped. The interest and attention you receive is on a completely different scale. I think I speak for most athletes when I say that I would happily take part in my sport even if it had no recognition. The bottom line is that anonymous training forms 99 per cent of what you do, so you need to love that or the one per cent just isn’t worth it.

Nonetheless everyone likes to know that people care about them and what they’re doing. Some of the responses that I have received to this blog have reminded me of how many people have cared over the years and thus contributed to getting ready to go. When a World Champion regularly asks how your training is going, or the Old Merchant Taylors’ Society think it worthwhile to offer you funding (the first such offer I have ever received!), it can only boost your confidence.

Another example of a confidence booster, albeit one I have had before this winter, is being invited to UK Athletics training days which are only open to those achieving certain strenuous performance targets. These give me a chance to speak to experts in different fields to whom only professionals can usually afford access. I ask them for their advice about nutrition, strength and conditioning, and even basic questions of lifestyle. Elite sport is not simply a matter of what you do at training but how you live your life. There is no point training and then not eating for hours or not getting enough sleep.

I took away from this training day a great sense of pride in disability athletics. Sometimes I think there’s a perception that everyone who wants a Paralympic medal gets one. Wrong. There must have been 30 athletes at this training day, all following full training programmes, but none of us are guaranteed a place in the 2012 team or a medal in 2016, though most had potential for one or both. Exactly the same would be true of a training day for able bodied athletes where most of them are still in their teens. I am sure the support the Paralympics receive in London will reflect this truth.

According to a recent(ish) blockbuster the world ends in 2012. It’s not quite as dramatic as that for Paralympic and Olympic athletes but the arrival of the New Year nonetheless hits home because it is now only six months until qualification. If we’re into the sprint finish of the metaphorical marathon I guess that suits me perfectly!  On the other hand the number of training sessions remaining is still comfortably in three figures so pacing myself is still necessary, although I am entering a more intense phase to celebrate the New Year.

Obviously the holiday season is a time where the additional commitment that defines the most determined athletes has to show itself most clearly. There are many stories of Christmas Day training, most famously Daley Thompson’s rationale that he did it purely to one up his rivals sitting at home. This current generation seems split – Mo Farah did a 10 mile run while Jess Ennis took a well-earned day off.

I take the Ennis approach. This might seem the soft option but it’s not. No training facilities are open and as a sprinter/jumper I need these places to do my training properly on good surfaces with marked distances and equipment. Consequently any Christmas Day session would have been of poor quality. I simply took my weekly rest day on Sunday instead of Monday and worked a seven day week on this occasion. I was rewarded with some cracking sessions that week including big personal bests in plyometric and weight training – something I always seem to do in the Christmas/New Year week, I guess to make it seem worthwhile. Everyone at this level trains in huge quantities, quality is the difference maker.

Christmas also means being back home in London from the beginning of December when term ends. This experience of having two different training locations which one has to switch between is something quite unique to university athletes. The key is to re-establish a good rhythm of training – knowing on what days and at what time you’re training and sticking to this. Ideally there should be as little change as possible between the two because the body gets used to being more or less tired at particularly points of the training week.

There are certainly differences between training in London and Oxford. There are less immediate distractions in Oxford. I don’t have a television and am generally in a more focused mindset because of the intensity of Oxford terms. However, the physical tiredness caused by the intensity of study sometimes affects the quality of training sessions. On the other hand in London I live reasonably close to three indoor tracks which is a massive benefit when I need to do higher intensity work because being outside in the cold at this time of year increases the risk of injury.

It was notable that I increased my combination jump personal best hugely when undertaking it indoors, although that might have been the adrenalin from trying to impress the watching former world triple jump silver medallist Yamile Aldama! Regardless, the opportunity to be one of few trying to combine elite sport and the intensity of study at Oxford, in the run up to London 2012, is worth enduring the odd cold snap.

Five weeks on from my last blog, I am now firmly into the depths of winter training. Certainly in athletics, and I’m sure in most other Olympic and Paralympic sports too, this is the time when you do the heavy lifting - metaphorically and literally! Early in the winter my principal aim is to improve my fitness, conditioning and general strength. For this all training sessions, regardless of whether they’re track, weights, circuits, jumps or hills, all follow the same pattern. This is high volume reps at average intensity with short recoveries in between. Once the body is sufficiently strong to handle it, the intensity is steadily raised to develop power and speed more specific to my events.

It can be a difficult period, especially for a sprinter/jumper. Naturally we all like to go really fast and jump really far (that’s why we do it, after all) but you have to rein yourself in and do what’s good for the long term. I’ve not been great at it in the past but I’ve been much better this year. Much as I’d rather not have had them, my injuries have helped with that – I know I need to look after my body now, whereas when I hadn’t had any, I thought I was indestructible and could go fast all winter. The other way of dealing with it is to focus on technique. This gives you a link to the summer, which is what you need to keep motivated, because when you’re running at 75% you wonder what the relevance is but the technique is always the same no matter what the speed. Sprinting and long jumping may appear two of the simplest sports in the world to the casual viewer, and perhaps they are, but they don’t seem like that when you’re aiming for the highest level. Flicking through my training diary reveals 15 different technical flaws that I’ve been working on eradicating and that’s only in seven weeks of training but it’s the time to do it as technique is easier to groove at a slower pace. Admittedly I’m still young and raw but it goes to show the importance of fine details, and the difference is often only changing the position of a foot or an arm by a few centimetres, but even over 50 strides of 100m or 18 strides + take off, air time and landing in the long jump it multiplies pretty quickly. And the margins are so small anyway.

This obsessive focus on technique is part of a concept I mentioned in a previous blog – hidden commitment. The way I see it there are four levels of commitment. There’s showing up for sessions and there’s trying really hard in sessions. Everyone can see when you do those two. Then there’s really thinking during you session about how to get better, rather than just doing it, which is what I talk about above. Even more committed than that is what you do away from sessions. Things like making sure I’m keeping the inflammation down on my ankle all day every day, spending up to an hour a night massaging myself to be fully ready for the next day, making sure I get proper rest and nutrition immediately after training sessions. What makes this hardest of all is that friends generally understand ‘can’t do that, I’ve got training.’ It’s a lot harder for them, even if they’re athletes, to understand ‘can’t do that, need to spend some alone time with a foam roller.’ But that massage is part of the difference between doing an average session and a really good session the next day. And that’s the key. Anyone can do a good session. It’s doing them every day for months that makes the difference.

I returned to Oxford on 6 October – my birthday. This acted as a rather terrifying reminder of quite how close we’re getting to the Olympics. Obviously I knew when I started out four years ago that I’d be 20 when 2012 came around. But that was literally a fifth of a lifetime ago; I had ages left. Not any more!

I did briefly consider taking a sabbatical this year to train full time, as several other Oxford 2012 hopefuls have. With most of the qualifiers happening in Trinity term, had I had exams this year I don’t think I would have had a choice. Fortunately I don’t and I chose to stay. If I’d been offered the chance to train with an elite group as others have it might have been different. But I haven’t so it doesn’t really seem worthwhile. Plus because my events are so explosive I can’t train for hours on end like some sports – the most I ever do in a day is two and a half hours.

Nonetheless combining training and work is difficult. It’s not in my nature to slack off at anything and in any case my first year exams showed I’m in with a chance of a First so my tutors certainly won’t let me. History is a good subject for a sportsman:  minimal contact time so I work when I like and train when I like. It surprises me that most of the athletics club seem to be scientists. Even so it’s very hard to concentrate properly when you’re tired from training, hence I try to train in the evenings as much as possible. But that’s not always possible when I have double sessions or need to use the gym when it’s less busy.

It was certainly an eye-opener to have a week in Oxford without training; it was nice to write an essay without feeling under pressure and attend socials (athletics club, naturally) without needing to stretch during them. Of course that has now ended. I’m back to eight full sessions per week, including three track, two weights, two jumps and one hill running session, as well as circuits on days I don’t double train. It’s strange how in six weeks you forget what being an athlete feels like. You’re permanently tired which is obviously a problem; I couldn’t walk properly after my first day of training and still had a double session that day. It’s most worrying when you realise how normal this unnatural state becomes – I couldn’t sleep properly during my rest period because I didn’t feel tired enough.

This is where the other reason for staying kicks in – the University Athletics Club. Most of my friends are members of the club and that’s great because they understand something of my mentality, which is not possible for non sportsmen, that training is not a choice. I’m the most talented member of the club but that’s a good thing – it means you’ve got a position to defend and that drives me on. I like the respect and status I have within the club and it’s a more immediate motivator in sessions; you can’t always think of the Paralympics. Yet I have a motivation even closer to home.

I’ve a fight just to be the best sportsman in my own flat – my next door neighbour Satya Gunput competed at the recent World Fencing Championships. What a coincidence that two of the Oxford undergraduates going for 2012 do the same subject at the same college! We shared a moment only high level sportsmen could appreciate last week – his head on the kitchen table exhausted after travelling to London and back for training and my foot submerged in icy water for 20 minutes to reduce swelling after a double session. Of course we were grinding away the next day with similar scenes in the evening. What was Einstein’s definition of insanity again?

The beginning of this blog follows on rather nicely from my first one. Or maybe not so nicely, given that was on the subject of injuries! I had hoped to bring news of my first senior national titles – I was overwhelming favourite for the long jump and would probably have taken the 100m too. Unfortunately my troublesome Achilles tendon became inflamed and I decided to end my season early. I could have run through it with reduced intensity training but given my injury history and Achilles tendons being so vital to sprinting and jumping it was a risk not worth taking. Maybe I am learning the virtues of patience and caution I set out in my last blog!

It’s not all doom and gloom – at the competition which triggered my injury I improved my long jump national record 15cm to 4.71m. It was an excellent series with all four jumps being over the B Qualification mark of 4.55m, showing that my personal best was no fluke but rather an indication of a level of performance I can consistently achieve in good conditions. If I am below the A Standard with perfect jumps I may as well give up but bad technique means room to improve.

With my last competition finished I am currently in the six week rest phase of the training cycle. This is as important as any other phase, giving the body time to recuperate from the previous 10 months of hard training and ensure that it can respond to the next 10 months effectively. Indeed having only three weeks of rest last winter was a significant factor in my injury hit season. It also gives me the chance to have a holiday and something approaching a ‘normal’ life.

That said it is not ‘rest’ as most non sportsmen would understand the term. I still train for an hour a day but this is low intensity work, strengthening the core muscles and the parts of my left leg which have suffered injuries in the past.

This period is also when winter training is planned. In the past my training has suffered from being split between several coaches, reaching farcical proportions last year when I had seven coaches setting sessions. It is impossible to get any coherent direction to training under those circumstances so this year one of Oxford’s sprint coaches Mark Thomas is setting my plan with Paddy O’Shea supervising long jump sessions.

It is vital that athletes are fully involved in planning training. It is this sort of hidden commitment I have sometimes lacked in the past, always putting everything into training but not spending enough time ensuring its effectiveness. So I was pleased that I travelled to Cardiff earlier this week to see Mark and plan my Paralympic year.

Training is planned backwards from the period you will peak and run your best races in. For athletes certain of qualification that will be September for the Games themselves but for me that is May and June since I need to ensure selection by July 8. Vital is to strike the correct balance between improvement and avoiding injuries – with such an early peak any lay off could be terminal for my chances.

Given my performances this year we also decided to place greater focus on the long jump and not prepare to race the 200m since my best chances lie in the former. This does not mean a lack of speed endurance work – which I desperately need – but a different type with more repetitions over shorter distance rather than fewer longer runs.

I mentioned my disdain for sporting clichés in my last blog but ‘fail to prepare, prepare to fail’ is one that I always approved of. I have fallen foul of this in the past by putting too much brawn and not enough brain into my training. This year is different. I have a coherent plan designed to improve my individual physical and technical weaknesses and reduce the omnipresent injury risk. ‘All’ that remains is seven months of hard focused execution.

Welcome to the first edition of my blog. I’m Daniel Hooker, a sprinter and long jumper. These monthly blogs will chart my progress towards the London Paralympics next September while hopefully revealing something about the challenges of combining high level sport and academia.

Great Britain has a great tradition in Paralympic sport, and in the last Paralympics Great Britain finished second overall.  In Paralympic sport there is a classification system which takes into account different kinds of disability and levels of impairment within those categories. My category in athletics is 31 to 38, which corresponds to cerebral palsy, and within that I am rated 37 because two of my limbs are affected.

One interesting discovery I have made since taking up regular athletics in 2007 is that all those seemingly mindless clichés sportsmen use – “you play best when you enjoy your sport”, “we need to take the positives out of this”, “pressure does funny things to people” - are in fact true. Unfortunately I’ve also learnt that injuries really are the worst thing in sport – not simply failing to achieve your goals as I had previously thought. With the latter you can still call yourself an athlete, still have the joy of running hard, still have the challenge of improving.

When you’re injured it’s hard to call yourself an athlete while hobbling everywhere, you can’t train with the intensity that shuts out everything else in the world, and you’re working hard simply to get back to where you were before. Basically running and jumping is fun, clocking up miles on cardio machines is not.

I’ve had a major injury taking me off the track for months in each of the last two winters. A torn Achilles tendon last winter and a torn calf muscle this. Naturally this has stunted my progress as each injury costs you gains made prior to it and the progress you would have made in the time spent doing rehab. As a sprinter and jumper weights and cardio is all well and good but you need to sprint and jump.

No doubt this sounds like excuses but it’s not. Injuries are an athlete’s fault. The training I was doing was too intense for that time of year. It’s a flaw of mine; I want overnight improvements and there’s no such thing in elite sport.

You could argue that my coaches are responsible for setting training but that’s passing the buck – as an athlete you know your body best and need to communicate that; instead I trained through minor niggles and made them worse. You also decide your coaching structure and I accepted having multiple coaches setting conflicting sessions which contributed to the problems – it was no individual coach’s fault but mine for not deciding between them. This winter I will have one coach for sprints, one for jumps. I might even (reluctantly) accept that you don’t need personal bests every session.

My calf problem meant that I have not been at 100 per cent between January and August. Nonetheless I have run the 100m B Qualifying Standard four times. More encouragingly the same happened in my first year of long jump – indeed with my second ever competitive jump! Having the B Standard means Britain could select me if they so wished. But they won’t unless I get the A Standard and even then there’s no guarantee. That means getting my 100m personal best from 13.02 to 12.60 and my long jump from 4.71m to 5.10m. It’s very possible, if I can avoid those injuries.