After retiring in 2024, the sprinter displays in regards to the challenges of creating the step as much as being a senior athlete and explains why she wish to assist the following era navigate that path
For so long as Jodie Williams can bear in mind, working has been her world. On the age of 11, she first laced up her sneakers and, as she places it, “simply fell into it”. What started as an informal pastime quickly developed into an obsession, one that will take her to the highest of the athletics world. After 19-year profession marked by worldwide success and its justifiable share of challenges, nevertheless, the three-time Olympian is now stepping away from the game that has formed her life.
Her rise was speedy. As a junior, Williams rapidly made a reputation for herself, shattering nationwide age group information – under-15 100m (11.56) and under-17 100m (11.24) and 200m (22.79). From there, she gained 100m and 200m gold on the World Youth Championships, following that up with a gold and silver on the World Junior Championships.
By the point she grew to become the European junior champion in 2011, Williams had firmly established herself as a pressure to be reckoned with within the athletics world, however that surroundings didn’t merge seamlessly with life away from the observe.
Whereas nonetheless in class and navigating the pressures of exams, she was additionally managing the calls for of being a world champion. Her success got here with a value and one which wasn’t all the time straightforward to bear.
“I by no means felt like I may connect with folks my age,” says the 31-year-old. “I’d maintain athletics very separate from all the pieces else.”
Regardless of her sporting achievements, there was an virtually uncomfortable feeling round sharing them. “I needed to maintain it quiet as a result of I used to be weirdly embarrassed about it,” she says. “I needed to be a standard woman and it was actually tough for me to navigate.
“Generally I’d disappear over summer season and I’d attempt to not inform anybody why however folks would see the information articles or typically movie crews got here to the varsity.
“My identify had already preceded me earlier than anybody bought an opportunity to get to know me. I used to be a child that already didn’t need to be seen so to deliver that additional consideration to myself was actually onerous. I used to be already a really awkward and uncomfortable teenager and it was a very tough time in my life. The toughest half was attempting to remain regular.”
Jodie Williams
That feeling of being misplaced solely intensified as Williams moved from the junior to senior ranks. At simply 18 years previous she was aiming to make her first Olympic Video games in London, although pulling up with harm on the trials meant she must wait till Rio 2016 to make her first Video games.
“Making an attempt to make an Olympic staff and transition to a senior function was very overwhelming,” she provides. “After I completed faculty it was a weight off my shoulders. That transition into the senior ranks is admittedly onerous for younger athletes.”
The method of creating that step as much as changing into a senior is a section that many younger athletes wrestle with – particularly ladies, who face a novel set of challenges. The stress to take care of peak efficiency whereas navigating pure modifications to the physique is one thing that isn’t straightforward, and sometimes goes unstated.
“As younger ladies, we’re growing at totally different occasions and a few ladies are very far forward of their improvement whereas others develop a lot later,” says Williams.
“You might be youthful competing in opposition to absolutely grown ladies at that age with a lot extra information, coaching years and knowledge than you and it’s tough to interrupt into that.
“That stage is admittedly tough however it’s a massive studying curve. I all the time regarded as much as older ladies and checked out what they had been doing and the way they navigated it. Each single particular person at senior degree is phenomenal at what they do and the taking part in subject ultimately ranges out a bit.”
However Williams wasn’t simply one other statistic. Quite than being misplaced to the game, by grit and willpower she made progress. Her first senior worldwide look on the European Indoor Championships in 2011 – the place she completed fourth within the 60m – was an indication of issues to come back.
Jodie Williams (Mark Shearman)
In 2014, she earned her first senior medals – European 4x100m gold and 200m silver including to the Commonwealth 200m silver secured in Glasgow earlier that 12 months. One other Commonwealth medal, this time over 400m in Birmingham, arrived in 2022.
That honour underlined Williams’ potential to adapt. In 2019, after years of excelling within the 100m and 200m, she determined to modify to the one-lap occasion. It was a daring transfer that, on the time, appeared a dangerous departure from the distances she beloved most. After it grew to become evident in coaching that she had the engine to compete over a lap, nevertheless, it felt like transfer to make.
“I all the time knew I used to be made for 400m however I’m a really passionate particular person and I’m going to go for the occasion that I really like,” says Williams. “The 200m was all the time my absolute ardour so I all the time pursued that.
“I by no means had any curiosity in working the 400m, regardless that I knew I had a expertise for it. I dabbled in it a pair years earlier than the pandemic and I had a while to suppose. I used to be changing into disillusioned with the game and I felt if I didn’t attempt one thing new, I used to be most likely not going to proceed within the sport for for much longer. I assumed it might shake issues up for me and it undoubtedly did.”
The choice paid off as she reached the Olympic ultimate in Tokyo in 2021 and and helped Staff GB safe a bronze medal within the ladies’s 4x400m on the Paris Olympics this summer season. After years of onerous work, private progress and overcoming self-doubt, Williams capped her profession in a approach many athletes dream of – on the Olympic podium.
» That is an abridged model of an extended characteristic that seems within the December concern of AW journal. Subscribe to AW journal right here, try our new podcast right here or signal as much as our digital archive of again points from 1945 to the current day right here