Bryony Shaw Talks Beijing Bronze - page 2

4 months ago 06th Jul 10:39

Also it sets you back because you re trying to grip onto the beam but it’s so painful, but I knew that I had to go through that pain barrier, and then there was a lot of forearm cramping but I knew that it was all inevitable.

It has been quite a struggle and a bit of an ego hit, I guess before then I had been so full time with it so that was the sacrifice that  I had to make; for the pleasure of having the break I had this mountain to climb but I’m getting there.

- And what was your whole Beijing experience like? What was it like being part of the very successful British team?

It was incredible as it was my first Olympic Games, I missed out on going to Athens, it was great to just be part of the team but I had a clear goal of wanting to medal. I think I was really helped by the fact that the British sailing is so successful as a British sport the kind of confidence that the other sailors have in the team and the standards that they maintain you ride along with it.  It’s almost as if you’re not a medal winner it’s a bit more unusual not to be a medal winner than if you do.

Yeah it was a very high standard and I just got swept a long with it and the encouragement from the other team members everyone just got stuck in, the other sailors but also the behind the scenes staff an my coach. We were in Qingdao, which was a bit remote from Beijing, so we had our own little site but we did get the chance to get over to Beijing for the closing ceremony.

That night I shared a room with the cycling girls, who had all been very successful, and it was amazing because we had watched the other sports to see how they were doing and we had this medal board so then to be over there and see those people, sailing and windsurfing doesn’t get that much coverage the real stars are in athletics and cycling. So for me seeing those guys on the TV I see them as the big stars. So for me to go over there and see Rebecca Addlington and Victoria Pendleton were just amazing and I wanted to get pictures with everyone.

- Windsurfing is perhaps not the most obvious sport to get involved with so how did you find it?

I kind of had an opportunity when I was on holiday with my family in France, we were just going to various camp sites in France, and there was this opportunity, we were on the south coast of one place, and we had the chance to go windsurfing and we gave it a try. It must have been really lucky to have been warm and a nice wind because I got on with it really well, I had done a bit of gymnastics and ballet so my balance was quite good, and I had always loved water sports.

Then on the same holiday we got the opportunity again and that was a little hook really. So when mum and dad said ‘do you fancy going on holiday?’ it was always can we go and do water sports? And my dad actually got a personal interest in windsurfing as well as he had been abroad and seen some guys who were the top level guys so he wanted to try it out and I already had an interest.

We went to the same place three years running, Dale in West Wales Pembrokeshire, in the third year, I was fifteen, we invested in some equipment for the family and took it back home, we were living in Oxford at the time. We didn’t live near the coast but we would go to a local reservoir and I would go up there, I had discovered that on a Wednesday there was a little group of windsurfers that went out and so I would go and hang out with them.

Eventually my dad got into the dingy sailing side of things  and when he retired, which was in 2001 I was 18 and had just finished schooling, him and mum moved to Weymouth. That year I took a year out and I got involved in racing when I was fifteen, I had found out that I was quite competitive, and there was this national scene where I could get involved there was a national squad of under seventeen’s and I had set myself this goal of getting on the national team.

So we went to all the races where I had to qualify and basically it was mum that ended up taking me to all these events, and she loved it as it was a social scene for her. It was just a great scene to be involved with and all wanted to do on my year out was windsurf and I made the jump from youth to adult relatively well and in 2002 I managed to get on performance funding and by then I was able to be a full time athlete.

I delayed my university course, I had a place at Cardiff University, but I had the clear goal of trying of the Athens Olympics and basically you have to the top sailor in Britain to go, there’s only one slot encounter, there was another British girl at the time and she ended up going, she was quite a few years older and more experienced.

At the time I was very much the rooky but it was a big disappointment for me not to qualify and I went to university for a year. The plan was to try and do both at the same time but it turned out that my university course was so full on and my Olympic manager phoned me up and told me that I was receiving this funding and that they would like me be full time.

They didn’t drag me out of university but I had a big decision to make but what was lucky the tutors at the university said that they would keep my place for me so it was a nice stage to give it another shot. It turned out that rather than going back I got the bronze medal the career choice seemed to pay off, I have certainly achieved the dream that I had as a young racer and now it’s quite an enjoyable career for me.

I have now got a really clear programme over the next four years up to London where we have got a really good opportunity, off the back of the medal, it’s a good platform and the support is so much more than it was before and we have got a really good opportunity with it being on home waters.
I don’t know if I would go back to architecture, I made a lot of friends there, but I don’t know if I would go back.

- And what does your training regime involve?

There are activities through the day today, for example, I have been on a bike ride I do a lot of road cycling which is mainly for the aerobic fitness and cardio. It’s good for your legs as well as windsurfing is an all body sport. This afternoon, I’m in Weymouth now, I’m going to head down and meet my coach and we will do a bit of sailing on the water basically looking at specific goals that we have highlighted, weaknesses and things like that.

There are so many different skills and drills that you can do on the water to break it all down into goals. This evening I can see the physiotherapist, we have a really good performance centre down here in Weymouth now, we have got a lot of specialists down so I can see the strength and conditioning trainer in the gym, ad I usually see him twice a week, I do quite a lot of power training in the gym.

- You are now the favourite to be amongst the gold medal contenders in 2012 so what kind of pressure does that put you under?

I put myself under the most pressure as I set my standards quite high. But as I said me and my coach have got a really clear programme and as long as you are confident that the programme is good and you are positive and stay focused and if you are prepared hopefully the pressure won’t get to you so much.
Having done an Olympic Games already I think that’s going to really help me and I will certainly learn from my experiences there.

I had to come back from a bad result at the Olympics and I managed to get myself back into the medals and finish on a high so it was a good thing to have been through that experience.

Hopefully these next Olympics, in terms of our sport, it really benefits those who have got that experience I will be twenty nine, hopefully still in good physical shape but that much more experienced when I get there. It’s all about ticking the boxes and keeping git fun and fresh and staying motivated.

We have outlined a good programme where there are intense part of training on the build up to a regatta and then scheduling in the rest days, you have got a goal to achieve and then a bit of a rest-bite. I think it’s important to just keep at the grindstone as that can be just too much and it’s nice to have those real intense periods but then to be able to down tool.  

- What are your hopes for the London Olympics in general? How excited are you about being able to compete at home?
 
I think it’s a massive opportunity. What is has done for us a sport a lot of what we do is travelling, we follow the world tour and a lot of it has been abroad, and in the past a lot of our training hasn’t been very UK based and the chance that we have got now we can set up, as we have in Weymouth, a really good performance centre. 

Being on home waters, I have sailed on Weymouth since I was sixteen years old, I very much know the waters here and it’s going to play to my strength. As windsurfers you have to contend will all sorts of different weather, wind and waves and performance is very specific to the venue and I think that if you are used to sailing in certain conditions if that turns up at a regatta then you are going to excel.

A lot of what we do in training is trying to cover all those bases but with Weymouth being where I have done most of my sailing it’s somewhere were I can feel quite at home and be natural and won’t have to worry about conditions that I’m not used to are going to be thrown in there. We just try and do as much sailing here as we can and just take advantage of the extra facilities that we can.

- Finally what’s next for you?

Well it’s preparing for the World Championships, which are in Weymouth; it brings the focus straight away, in the first year of the Olympic cycle, on Weymouth and performing at the Olympic venue. It’s a good opportunity and one I really want to stamp my home authority on really and not show anyone that I have got any weakness sailing here. It’s one I would really like to target to win or achieve a podium on. 

We are just going to spend a lot of the next few months based in Weymouth, training as I say, focusing in on those weaknesses and trying to get fitter.

I have just done a European Championships in Israel and I got the bronze medal to be on the podium at this stage of the year, after having that big break, at a major championships I’m happy with where my sailing has got me to so far and hopefully over the next few months it will keep improving and my confidence will keep building.

FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw