Health and Wellbeing correspondent Molly Horne asks Team GB athletes about motivation and the right diet to keep you going under pressure.
Rewind four years when as a nation we collectively conquered the biggest sporting event ever to take place here. There’s no debate; East London did the motherland proud.
Fast forward and in less than six months the summer games will be held in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, home to the looming Zika virus – but that won’t stop them. The competitors will be on their mark, getting set and going for the biggest moments of their career in front of a 900 million strong global audience.
So how exactly does a world-class athlete manage to keep motivated during the grey days of February? And what is the best diet to keep you energised under mounting pressure? Rising East spoke to Team GB athletes about the stresses of being one race away from an Olympic final.
Suldan Adde, representing Team GB in the 400m, says motivation is no problem “when you have to race.” Being nervous before a race is all part of how you perform, the 26-year-old added. The hard part is “keeping yourself motivated” to maintain focus, so that you “spend the energy you do have on the track” – and nowhere else.
Training six days a week at the track is not for the light hearted. Blood, sweat and tears form the foundations of the necessary commitment. Luke Lennon-Ford, another 400m competitor with an impressive personal best of 45.23 seconds, insists that, “Self-motivation has to happen all year round! Even when I’m not racing or training, I’ve got to have that self-belief and keep myself positive because I know that when I get to the starting line I need to be ready to race any opponent.”
Team GB’s 100m sprinter Rion Pierre says that trying to control your nerves is not a priority when it comes to competing. “I don’t keep calm, I don’t try to control myself. I was made to do this and was trained under high pressure, so competitions aren’t really anything different. I just go out there, set up, and try my best.”
Nigel Levine, a further contender in the 400m, uses music to cope with stress: “a lot of Lil Wayne, 50 Cent or a bit of drum and bass to take my mind off the pressure.”
You Are What You Eat
Suldan Adde calculates that what he eats is just as important as 4-5 hours training, six days a week. He says that muesli is the perfect, pre-workout snack, followed a post-workout protein shake, to help mend and build muscles.
Lennon-Ford prefers bananas “as my pre workout snack. They give you 90 minutes of energy – a great source of vitality before a training session.” Having protein-rich foods such as chicken and nuts is also something he favours.
There are only a few more months of training before the excitement of Rio kicks in. Let’s hope all their hard work pays off.
The Games of the XXXI Olympiad commence in Rio de Janeiro on 5 August 2016.