With the eyes of the world on sport in Britain at the moment, we caught up with one of Britain’s most impressive athletes, the four-time World Ironman champion Chrissie Wellington.
She tells us what she’s doing with her year off, what her hopes are for the Olympic legacy and discusses whether inclusion of the Ironman distance triathlon is ever going to be likely for the future.
Image credit: Larry Maurer
You’re having a year off at the moment in which you’ve tried everything from rowing to paralympic cycling. Is there anything else you have done or want to do?
That’s right, as I am having this year off I have used it to try loads of different sports. I kayaked yesterday - I love kayaking, it’s amazing, it’s beautiful, especially on days like yesterday. It’s a great work out and it is also very, very social. As you said I also tried rowing, I played wheelchair basketball when I was in Bermuda as part of a charity event there and I have been doing a lot more off road running and off road biking which is something I don’t necessarily do when I am in training.
The other thing I swore I wouldn’t do was get in an enclosed indoor pool in my year off, so I have been doing a lot of open water swimming which has been amazing. I love open water swimming it is so liberating.
Do you normally not get to do much open water swimming as part of your training?
Normally it’s a lot more structured. I think you need those quantifiable indicators that come from time on the clock and the definite measurement that comes from 50 or 25 metre pool. We do some open water swim practise but it definitely isn’t the main part of our swim training.
So you’re just taking the one year off, and then it’s back to action?
That is the intention, I want to use this year to get the balance, to reprioritise and to work out where I want my life to go. I feel so satisfied with everything that I have achieved in Ironman - I have been world champion four times, I’m undefeated and I have the world record.
I have achieved more than I ever imagined and I think it’s important to me to have a new challenge and if I am brutally honest this year has been the biggest challenge of all. The easiest thing is to go back to Ironman because it is something I am very comfortable with. It’s my comfort zone but this year is out of my comfort zone - it is the biggest emotional challenge of all not to have a structure, not to have that single minded focus on a goal.
So it’s almost a security blanket having something to aim for? It gives you an identity?
Absolutely. I think you understand that this year has been a bigger challenge then racing has been, but in a different way. Someone said to me ‘Chrissie, what is your goal for this year?’ And I said ‘My goal is to live every single moment.’ I think that is an as honourable goal as aiming for the World Championship but just in a different way.
You’ve achieved so much, what keeps you hungry?
I know that is what I need to be mindful of and every athlete needs to be confident about what they want to achieve in the sport and why they want to achieve it. But don’t get me wrong, success is addictive, you want to do things that you are good at. You need to make sure you are doing it for you and you are doing it because it is the right thing to do as part of your life.
Image credit: Larry Maurer
Will you be watching the World Championships in Hawaii this year?
Yes I will be over there. I want to be able to support everybody and obviously my boyfriend will be racing, so I will definitely be there.
Do you think seeing someone else take the title will fire you up and make you want to claim it back?
Definitely. I will use the World Championships this year as a indicator but I mustn’t get carried away with those emotions and must remember the reason why I decided to take a break.
Let’s talk about the Olympics now, what are your hopes?
What I want to see is sports that inspire participation at the grassroots. That will be the true measure of success at the Olympics. Yes the number of gold medals we win is important but the success that filters down to the grassroots needs to get women and girls interested again. The stats are horrendous and we have an amazing opportunity right now to mainstream, not even sport, but just activity into the life of the everyday person.
But that needs investment, it needs effective marketing, it needs facilities and it needs support both private and public, and that for me will be the true test of whether or not the Olympics have been successful.
Would you ever like to see Ironman as an Olympic event?
I don’t know if necessarily the Ironman will, but I would like to see long course triathlon, so a longer distance than the Olympic distance, and non-drafting where they sit in a pack. Perhaps a 3km swim, a 120km ride and a 30km run.
I mean we have the ITU Long Distance Triathlon World Championships, so there is absolutely no reason why it can’t be integrated into the Olympics and I would really like to see the Olympic committee consider it going forward. I think it would be an amazing opportunity to showcase the sport. Having said that, the World Championships in Hawaii are the pinnacle of our sport and every single athlete wants to race the very, very best in the world in the sport of their choice. The sport of my choice is Ironman and I race a very competitive world at the World Championships. So in my view I have my equivalent of Olympic gold, and that is the most important thing for me.
But there are certainly developments - how about the integration of the paratriathlon into the Paralympics?
Yes, it will be part of the 2016 Paralympics which is great news for the sport and Great Britain, as GB is a force to be reckoned with in paratriathlon. We are leaders on the world stage and I just went to the GB paratriathlon camps a couple of months ago and they are all ready. They are putting a significant amount of time and energy, not just money in getting our athletes ready.
Designed to Win at the Design Museum - Image credit: Luke Hayes
You’re talking to us today from the Designed to Win exhibition at the Design Museum. What’s your involvement with this?
I’ve been an Oakley athlete for the past five years and they have been working to create this incredible exhibition so I’m here to represent them. It’s a huge celebration for me of innovation in sport. It’s great to see how technology has developed, progressed and adapted. What I find interesting is how the innovation in one sport can inform another, so for example, innovation in car design informs the development of sun glasses so there are analogies between the sports.
What’s interesting is that I haven’t always been interested in bikes - I hadn’t even ridden a road bike before 2000! So it is quite interesting for me to look at some of the bikes that were made way before my interest in cycling was kind of catalysed.
Louise Hudson, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine
For more info on the Designed to Win exhibition visit designmuseum.org/exhibitions/current-exhibitions
