Axford is used to the camaraderie of workforce sport, however thinks there’s a false impression that athletics is at all times a lonely, particular person pursuit.
“We have now a workforce of six ladies who’re going out to compete [at the European Cross Country Championships in Antalya],” she mentioned.
“There’s a workforce end result on the finish of it as effectively, that’s one thing that I actually get pleasure from concerning the sport and one thing I wasn’t anticipating.
“Everybody may be very supportive, everybody needs to see you succeed.”
But ladies’s middle-distance working is experiencing a golden period within the UK, with Olympic 800m champion Keely Hodgkinson joined by Jemma Reekie and Bell in a uncommon British one-two-three on the prime of the space’s world efficiency lists.
Additional worldwide alternatives for Axford is not going to come simple, however for now the stress is off as she dips her toe within the muddy fields of cross nation.
“It’s undoubtedly going to be a little bit of studying in addition to having fun with the second,” she mentioned.
“It’s only a actual alternative for me to see how I line up in opposition to among the greatest in Europe.”
Axford will then chase qualifying occasions for the European Indoor Championships in March, with the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles a long-term hope, simply because it was in her earlier sport.
“I used to be fortunate to have been coached by [2016 Olympic hockey champion and former GB captain] Alex Danson once I performed hockey,” she mentioned.
“She is an unimaginable individual and somebody I look as much as rather a lot. Her values and integrity, you may take into any sport.”