Karen Pickering - Britain's most successful swimmer BBC & Channel 4 Commentator
Blog
Friday, 14 October 2011
Evening Star column: David Haye, "21st Century Legacy" and doping laws
FORMER world champion David Haye announced his decision to retire from boxing this week and I know just how it will have been to make such a decision. Boxing, like swimming requires years of dedication and David will have been boxing since an incredibly young age and it will have been his life. It is so difficult to step away from your chosen sport as it almost provides safety and comfort as you know that you work to a routine during training and are always striving towards a goal and when you are going to achieve it. It is a simple life really and it is something as a sportsman or woman you have been doing for the majority of your life.
I am sure there will be plenty of other opportunities for him out there but trying to make his mark at something else, when in boxing he will have no doubt have been a perfectionist like most competitors, is difficult.
He is fortunate that he has been able to make the decision himself and has not been forced to make it through injury but that will not make the transition period any easier.
I struggled when I made the decision to finish swimming even though I retired gradually and wound down for a year and let other opportunities take me away from the pool rather than fitting other jobs around swimming.
I went to the World Championship Trials towards the end of that season and whilst I knew I would not qualify for the team, I decided to see how disappointed I would be and therefore how desperate I was to continue swimming.
If I had found that I was not ready to quit, I would have returned to full time training for Commonwealth Games the following year but I did not feel that desperation.
In some sports, such as football, you can retire from the international game but still play domestically. In Olympic sports, the athletes don't have that luxury as they won't be earning any money. The only way they will be able to continue is by doing the sport as a hobby.
It is not easy to quit and I wish David all the best, he is a lovely guy.
I ATTENDED the launch of a new project led by 1968 400m hurdles Olympic champion, David Hemery, yesterday.
The '21st Century Legacy' is a project aimed at school children which encourages them to be the best they can be in whatever field or career they choose to follow.
The programme will see a host of Olympians, Paralympians and other people go into schools and share their stories and hopefully act as a motivation and inspiration to the pupils.
The good thing about this programme is that it will be run throughout the school term and the athletes will be able to return at the end of the projects to see how the children are progressing. Among the aims of the project is for the school children to identify their goals and how they will achieve them and it will also help to eradicate that fear of failure which is especially prevalent amongst girls. The children will be able to sit down and say, 'this is what I want to do and this is how I'm going to do it'.
I remember when I was at school one of my teachers laughed at me, to my face, when I said I wanted to compete at the Olympics when I grew up. I have selective hearing and it didn't deter me but some children may not go for their goals if they are ridiculed.
AMERICAN athlete LaShawn Merritt will now be able to compete at next year's Olympics in London, after the Court of Arbitration for Sport over turned a ruling made by the International Olympics Committee (IOC). The IOC's rule 45 states that anyone banned for a doping offence for six months or more should miss the next Olympics, even if their suspension has expired, but this was successfully challenged by Merritt and has opened the door for several drug cheats from America to compete in London.
I think it is a real shame that this stance has been taken and I hope the BOA (British Olympic Association) stays as strong as ever in its stance on drug cheats. The BOA issues a lifetime Olympic ban to drug cheats but the difference between the BOA's stance and the IOC's is that the BOA offers an appeal process and I think that is a key element.
I competed against drug cheats on many occasions and it was awful.
I am sure there will be plenty of other opportunities for him out there but trying to make his mark at something else, when in boxing he will have no doubt have been a perfectionist like most competitors, is difficult.
He is fortunate that he has been able to make the decision himself and has not been forced to make it through injury but that will not make the transition period any easier.
I struggled when I made the decision to finish swimming even though I retired gradually and wound down for a year and let other opportunities take me away from the pool rather than fitting other jobs around swimming.
I went to the World Championship Trials towards the end of that season and whilst I knew I would not qualify for the team, I decided to see how disappointed I would be and therefore how desperate I was to continue swimming.
If I had found that I was not ready to quit, I would have returned to full time training for Commonwealth Games the following year but I did not feel that desperation.
In some sports, such as football, you can retire from the international game but still play domestically. In Olympic sports, the athletes don't have that luxury as they won't be earning any money. The only way they will be able to continue is by doing the sport as a hobby.
It is not easy to quit and I wish David all the best, he is a lovely guy.
I ATTENDED the launch of a new project led by 1968 400m hurdles Olympic champion, David Hemery, yesterday.
The '21st Century Legacy' is a project aimed at school children which encourages them to be the best they can be in whatever field or career they choose to follow.
The programme will see a host of Olympians, Paralympians and other people go into schools and share their stories and hopefully act as a motivation and inspiration to the pupils.
The good thing about this programme is that it will be run throughout the school term and the athletes will be able to return at the end of the projects to see how the children are progressing. Among the aims of the project is for the school children to identify their goals and how they will achieve them and it will also help to eradicate that fear of failure which is especially prevalent amongst girls. The children will be able to sit down and say, 'this is what I want to do and this is how I'm going to do it'.
I remember when I was at school one of my teachers laughed at me, to my face, when I said I wanted to compete at the Olympics when I grew up. I have selective hearing and it didn't deter me but some children may not go for their goals if they are ridiculed.
AMERICAN athlete LaShawn Merritt will now be able to compete at next year's Olympics in London, after the Court of Arbitration for Sport over turned a ruling made by the International Olympics Committee (IOC). The IOC's rule 45 states that anyone banned for a doping offence for six months or more should miss the next Olympics, even if their suspension has expired, but this was successfully challenged by Merritt and has opened the door for several drug cheats from America to compete in London.
I think it is a real shame that this stance has been taken and I hope the BOA (British Olympic Association) stays as strong as ever in its stance on drug cheats. The BOA issues a lifetime Olympic ban to drug cheats but the difference between the BOA's stance and the IOC's is that the BOA offers an appeal process and I think that is a key element.
I competed against drug cheats on many occasions and it was awful.
When you are standing on the blocks before the race and you are next to someone who has served a ban, you know you are not competing against them on level playing field.
Okay, so they may have served their ban but as I have said before, the effects of doping can last a lifetime and they can just stand there with not a care in world, not worrying that they have denied a fellow athlete medals, prize money and potential funding.
Okay, so they may have served their ban but as I have said before, the effects of doping can last a lifetime and they can just stand there with not a care in world, not worrying that they have denied a fellow athlete medals, prize money and potential funding.
