Brownlee continues to chase his dream
JONNY BROWNLEE might have completed the Olympic medal set but is still racing and chasing his lifelong dream: the perfect triathlon.
The 32-year-old memorably completed the set of Olympic medals with mixed relay gold in Tokyo having won individual silver and bronze at the previous two Games.
Brownlee stepped off the blue carpet and announced he was done and dusted over Olympic distance – like brother Alistair, he would step up to longdistance racing.
First, Jonny’s plan was to jet off on a long holiday and switch off from training. How did that go? “Not much of that really happened,” chuckled the Leeds star. “I planned but didn’t book stuff and that was probably the mistake I made.
“I’m an endurance athlete, my default is to train. Looking back I probably did go back into training too quickly and I should have enjoyed the post-Tokyo period a bit more.
“I wanted to carry on from a good Tokyo, to keep coming back and showing I can do it.”
Among the things that turned Brownlee’s head was the revelation from a reporter in interviews after the mixed relay that his run leg had been the fastest of the whole field.
That planted the seed for one of the sharpest U-turns in swim, bike, run history – a fact that his nearest and dearest won’t let him forget.
“My training partners and girlfriend have been telling me ‘you weren’t going to do this, you weren’t going to try and qualify,’” he said.
“Hearing about how quick I’d run made me go, ‘wow, maybe I can do this again!’
“I’ve changed the mentality of training and being more relaxed around it. I definitely got carried away with wanting every session to be perfect and better than the week before.
“I’ve gone into it with the view that a decent session is 95 per cent of the way there, you can’t be a world-beater every day. Secondly, nutrition, I’ve made a big change because my diet wasn’t the best. I’m eating less bread, less cakes, less sugar. It’s about relaxing into it and Tokyo helped with that, knowing I’ve achieved everything I ever wanted to achieve.”
Swim, bike, run in Britain will have a 2022 to remember with AJ Bell 2022 World Triathlon Championship Series Leeds on 11-12 June, triathlon and paratriathlon at Birmingham Commonwealth Games on 29 and 31 July, and Volvo 2022 World Triathlon Para Series Swansea on 6 August. www. britishtriathlon.org/events/major-events