Parents & Guardians - SportsAid

When I was a child, I decided to take up gymnastics. School gymnastics wasn’t enough, so I joined a training facility which involved travelling over an hour by car over 4 days a week to train for several hours. My mum used to drive me to these trainings, and wait for me in the car patiently, in some cases bringing me dinner to eat right after the sessions before starting us on the long drive home. She would also travel, in some cases internationally, to support me at competitions. I then decided to take up hockey. My mum and Dad used to come to most of my hockey games; my Dad even coached my team for a short while. I then decided to take up athletics. My mum would drive me to most of my trainings and support me at all my competitions without fail, even travelling internationally in some cases. You can see the pattern.

During the highest highs of my career, my family were with me every step of the way. My mum and sister took me to my first National Championships where I earned medals and the opportunity to represent my country. My Dad was on the finish line at my first international race for Great Britain, where I picked up a silver medal with my 4x400m team.

They were also with me for the lows. I remember my Dad standing on the finish line of National Championships in 2019. I had ran a personal best of 52 in the 400m heats, but unfortunately struggled to reproduce that performance in the final, coming 7th and losing out on qualifying for the World Championships 4x400m team as I hoped.

“It didn’t go so well,” I told him, out of breath, sadly.

“That’s okay,” he responded, sincerely. “You came out, you gave it a go.”

My father came a long way in terms of support and understanding of my journey in athletics. I remember when I first told him I wanted to be a professional athlete.

“Are you sure that’s a career path you want to go into?” He had concerns about it being a viable career path, and issues such as doping. A few years later, I found a Youtube channel with all of my major races catalogued under my Dad’s name. I realised he had been quietly recording and uploading all of my races. While it was a new world that was difficult for him to comprehend, I felt his desire to uplift and support me. There may have been a shortage of knowledge and understanding of athletics, but there was never a shortage of love.

SportsAid play a key role in helping parents support their children in their elite sport journeys. SportsAid helps parents and guardians by giving them advice, insight and knowledge, both through online and in-person workshop sessions, on how they can offer the best support to their children as they navigate the performance pathway. This also includes a partnership with BelievePerform - the world’s leading source of performance psychology, wellbeing and mental health content for the sport community - which offers support to SportsAid athletes and their parents and guardians.

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