Five-times Olympic medallist quits sport at 40... to find something she’s good at!
THERE is a saying in sport that an athlete will die twice, the first time at retirement. Katherine Grainger, recently crowned Britain’s most decorated female Olympian, is having none of it. With five medals from five consecutive Olympics, the 6ft rower concedes she has her work cut out ‘to find something she’s good at’ when she’s been one of the best in the world at something else.
But none of her alternative skills – she’s a black belt in karate, an expert juggler and isn’t at all bad on the clarinet – immediately leap out as a possible new career path.
‘It’s early days,’ she laughs. ‘But I knew this day would come. It’s inevitable, whatever your career in sport is. It’s a lot like leaving school or university. Some people always have the next job lined up, but not me.
‘Rowing is all I’ve known since I was a student and I’ve honestly no idea yet what I want to do next. That’s scary.’
Speaking to The Scottish Mail on Sunday in her first major interview since returning triumphantly with her silver medal from Rio de Janeiro, the 40-year-old added: ‘As athletes, we live in this intense, obsessional, competitive environment. Sport gives you that real focus and a goal to aim for. It’s also an emotional rollercoaster of winning, losing and training.
‘But now I’m stepping into a world where the rules are different, where you don’t really know where your strengths are or what you are going to be good at.
‘I have, however, at least faced up to the fact that it’s not about replacing this world I’ve lived in for 20 years. If I tried to do that, I would never be satisfied.’
FOR now, she’s happily enjoying a holiday with her family in Scotland. Within 24 hours of arriving at Heathrow with the rest of jubilant Team GB last Wednesday, she was in her car driving north from her home near the National Rowing Centre in Berkshire, to Edinburgh, the city where her parents still live and where her love of the sport first took off at university.
Joining them for a family reunion are elder sister Sarah and two-year-old nephew, Seth, who has had her awake since 7am wanting her to read Goldilocks and the Three Bears to him – as well as sing ‘Row, row, row your boat….’
Fresh from a water-fight in the garden, she’s in a relaxed mood as she says being plain ‘Auntie Kafferine’ – he can’t pronounce the ‘th’ – as opposed to the recent headlines declaring her ‘Katherine the Great’, helps her at this time of uncertainty.
‘He doesn’t care how many medals I have, he’s not interested in the Olympics,’ she smiles. ‘After the final, my family played back the footage a couple of times on TV. Eventually Seth got fed-up and started shouting “No more rowing!”. He’s hilarious and just being around him, and them, keeps me grounded.’
Family support has been crucial, especially as she contemplated whether or not to take up rowing again for another Olympics after a two-year break following London 2012, where she won gold after silvers in Sydney, Athens and Beijing.
After much soul-searching, she decided to team up with Vicky Thornley, 28, from Wales, but the pair’s Olympic dream almost ended before it had begun.
Four years earlier, with her previous partner, Anna Watkins, they could do no wrong, leaving every opponent in their wake. But her pairing with Vicky Thornley in the double sculls couldn’t have been more different as Miss Grainger, who only returned to fulltime rowing in September 2014, struggled to get back her previous form.
‘I don’t regret my time away,’ she says. ‘I needed a mental break. I spent the first year hoping something else would come up to take me away from it entirely. But that didn’t happen.’
By the end of the second year, having finished a PhD in the ethics of criminal law at King’s College London, she realised she was coming round to the idea of a return when she found, during appearances on TV as a pundit, she was subconsciously watching it as an ‘athlete’ rather than a commentator.
‘It was a big decision,’ she said. ‘I’ve always been fit but it’s surprising how much your fitness drops away from elite training. The average fit person is a world away from being fit enough to be part of a national team.’
But it wasn’t just the physical side and her age – there were also comments about her ability to replicate the success of London 2012.
‘A lot of people warned I could crash and burn spectacularly. I was getting comments like: “Why would you even try?” “You could disappear over the horizon in a really weak way, rather than finish on a high”. But life is about taking risks. I realised whatever happened, nothing could take away the
results of the past. It would be that I had tried one more challenge and it hadn’t worked out. I just had an innate belief I could make it work.’
She adds with a laugh: ‘I also knew it would be hard on my parents because they were looking forward to me having a normal life.’
In fact, after London, Miss Grainger revealed she’d had a ‘good number of marriage proposals’ from men who had somehow tracked down her email address, adding that at least her mother was pleased ‘because I’ve been on the shelf a bit too long and she wants me married off’.
Yesterday, Miss Grainger admitted she was still going through emails following Rio, so had ‘no idea’ yet if any more offers were on the table.
She added: ‘As far as I know there have been no marriage proposals this time, but I still have many emails and messages that have arrived since the Olympics I haven’t had time to work through yet, so you never know!’
The result in Rio was all the sweeter because, she admits frankly, it was unexpected, given the pair’s form only 12 weeks before. They failed to make the podium at the European Championships in May and dissolved their partnership soon after. They both tested for the women’s eight but weren’t selected in the initial squad announced in July.
DECIDING to give their partnership a second attempt, they were made to wait before being controversially confirmed in the squad at the last minute. ‘It was all very gloomy for a while but even on the darkest of days I didn’t regret coming back,’ she recalled. ‘When we finally had confirmation that Vicky and I would be the double and we were now down to a matter of weeks left before Rio, we had to come together, along with our coach, and make sure our focus was simple and singular.’
They astounded many by reaching the final where they led until the last 150 metres when they were overtaken by Poland’s Magdalena Fularczyk-Kozlowska and Natalia Madaj, who won by just 0.95 seconds.
The result was summed up by fourtime Olympic champion Matthew Pinsent on Twitter: ‘Brilliant brilliant brilliant. One of the most amazing @ TeamGB stories this year.’.
Yesterday, Miss Grainger added: ‘I’ve learned a lot about myself in the last couple of years. I’ve asked more of myself as a person, as well as an athlete, than I’ve ever done before.’
But the obvious question is, how did she feel not to achieve gold again?
She reflects: ‘I remember at the start of this campaign feeling if I could come out with anything, a medal of any kind, it would probably be my greatest achievement. I didn’t have anything to fall back on this time. The day after, I watched the race footage and I confess I struggled with it when I saw how close we were. There’s obviously an element of what might have been. But looking back at that footage, there was nothing more we could have done and to get the silver was amazing.’
As to her first ‘proper’ job, at the moment she’s liaising with a Performance Lifestyle Adviser from the English Institute of Sport, at Bisham Abbey, to help her take that next step. She said: ‘The advisers help with planning a life alongside a career in sport and also for the very challenging ‘transition’ period moving from sport to a life beyond.’
Whatever her long-term future may be, one thing likely to come next is a Damehood in the New Year’s Honours list. She’s already a CBE but, in typically understated fashion, she says: ‘We’ll see. It would be incredible, though every single medal I’ve won was with someone else and I couldn’t have done it without them.’