Meet a Sporting Hero

Sally Gunnell is an Olympic hero. Mums and Dads who are old enough will remember that amazing 400 metre hurdles victory at the Barcelona Olympics and the figure wrapped in the Union Jack afterwards. Not just that though, she’s a real sports champion.  For a time in the early nineties, she truly dominated the world of women’s hurdling. She won the Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth 400 metre hurdles in succession and thus became the first woman athlete to simultaneously hold all four major international titles in an individual event. Peter Watson from Primary Times met her to talk about the 2012 Olympics and you can certainly see just how much the Olympics means to her.

With applications for tickets for the 2012 Olympics open until 26 April, we talked a bit about the various events she might be going to. Sally and her husband have three boys and not surprisingly, they are a very sporty family.   Between them, the boys are very keen to see BMX biking, boxing and football while Sally is unsurprisingly looking forward to the track and field events.   Sally was very excited about the “Pay your Age” scheme available in more than 200 sessions. Anyone 16 and under only will only pay their age for tickets for these sessions so if you’re eight, you pay just £8. You can find out which sessions and price brackets are available on www.tickets.london2012.com.  Apply for London 2012 tickets at www.tickets.london2012.com any time between now and 26th April. Don’t forget to tick the pay your age box to get your reduced price tickets.

Sally has been working with LOCOG (the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games) on ticketing and enthusing potential volunteers. Sally is also a British Olympic Association Ambassador and will be mentoring competitors in these games.This involves working not just in her own sport but getting involved with some of the lesser known sports, going to their trials, talking to them, their coaches and sponsors,    Ambassadors can pass on tips about handling expectations and the pressure this brings and how to make sure that competitors bring out their best on the day. Seventy per cent of national teams have under 500 competitors in them and most are first time Olympians. Figures show that most athletes will not get a medal in their first games and the ambassador scheme is designed to give them more of a chance.

We asked Sally what inspired her to become a top athlete. She told us that at her primary school, she found from playing in the playground and school sports day that she was fast and that her PE teacher persuaded her to join a club and then at fourteen, she was spotted by a top coach. In terms of people inspiring her, she remembers Seb Coe and Daley Thompson at the Moscow Olympics and later Shirley Strong, a British 100metre runner, and Ed Moses. We had the nerve to ask why she chose hurdles and not just running.  Sally told us that she’d actually started as a long jumper and then moved to the heptathlon where athletes compete across seven different events. Her strongest event turned out to be the hurdles and she started to concentrate on the 100 metres hurdles and later the 400 metres hurdles. Sally felt that having done so many events was really good. She’d encourage any youngster starting out to try lots of different sports and events, to develop different muscles and skills and only later to specialise. This brought us on to talking about how today’s young sports people can get started. She encouraged them to try as many different sports as possible. Develop lots of different skills; balance and coordination are key at this stage. When you find a sport you really like, think about joining a club. Many junior sections will let you join at 8, 9 or 10. More than anything else, enjoy it.  Whether its athletics, football, netball or dance, getting involved in a physical activity will stand you in good stead for future life.

We talked a bit about what happens between now and the games. Sally told us that over the months leading up to the games, there will be lots of different activities available both in schools and outside. Many different organisations will be involved in all sorts of schemes and projects. For Sally, a key element of the Olympics is to inspire people both young and old to get more involved in sports and other physical activities. We potentially have great health and obesity problems coming up over the next few decades and getting people and especially younger people more active now will have massive benefits both for themselves and the wider society. It’s about inspiring people to do more physical activities but beyond that to look at their lifestyle and the sorts of things they eat and do in their everyday life. The Olympics can provide a catalyst for people to change their lives.