Haven helps Miley chase the top prize
FOR ALL BREAKING SPORTS NEWS VISIT
HANNAH MILEY may have journeyed far and wide but Inverurie will always be home. It’s a haven which insulates the Scot from the winds outside, somewhere she is afforded anonymity even as the town’s celebrity-in-residence.
‘It’s quite nice because you can slot back into the day-to-day routine of being in the town when you go back,’ explained the 26-year-old.
‘There are quite a few shopkeepers that know me and they’ll ask how my competitions have gone or they’ll have kept track and be asking me about it.
‘If I’m out in the morning training at the pool before the public session starts, folk will hang around to chat. It’s quite nice to know they take an interest.’
Alarms will be set, takeaways ordered and strong coffee placed on tap when their local heroine chases one of the first gold medals on offer in Rio today in the 400metres individual medley. The heats are this afternoon, the final tonight. There is no time to pause and reflect. Do or die. Survive, and then conquer.
Despite moving to Aberdeen to train ahead of the Games, the twice-Olympic finalist prefers the tranquility of the town she grew up in some 15 miles away. There is pride in what she has accomplished on the global stage but also a respect returned.
‘Recently I had to train on a Friday afternoon to make up a session I’d missed and there was a primary school group of seven or eight year olds in before me,’ she revealed. ‘They all recognised me, which was really bizarre. And they weren’t subtle about it.
‘I heard this little voice going: “Oh my God, it’s Hannah Miley”. I’m chuckling to myself because I can hear it but they think they’re being quiet.’
Then they started waving. Every one of them remained behind to watch her go through the brutal monotony of swimming length after length up and down the pool. Maybe one of them will be an Olympian in future, inspired by what they witnessed.
‘Coming back from competitions to know that young kids are getting excited about being in the water because of what I’ve done is nice,’ smiled Miley. ‘And that’s what I love about the little town. Everybody knows everyone. No one makes a big fuss. I can just settle back into normality.’
It’s helped that her father, Patrick, has sheltered her from undue intrusion. As her coach, he has presided over world, European and Commonwealth medals but only latterly has he dedicated himself fully to the cause, retiring from a long career as a helicopter pilot to take up a role as the University of Aberdeen’s highperformance coach, It says something about the wastefulness of the country’s sporting system that someone wise enough to be consulted by many of the sport’s greats — Ian Thorpe included — has not been funded to lend his expertise full-time. ‘He was involved as a coach at my club Garloch all the time I was growing up,’ recalled Miley. ‘He did triathlons back then but someone approached him to come along and help, even before
dailymail.co.uk/ sport
I had joined. He took sessions, coaching swimmers to be the best they could possibly be. Just volunteering, never getting paid. It’s crazy now to think that it’s only in the past few months, in Aberdeen, that he is finally getting paid to coach.’
He will be at her side today and again when she races the 200 individual medley next week.
How proud Inverurie would be if his daughter were, at last, to walk away from an Olympics with a medal around her neck.
‘There is a chance,’ she said. ‘I’ve been ranked in the top five for the last seven years. I’m up there. I just need that little bit of magic. I can’t control what anyone else does.
‘If I do the best I can do, and it’s good enough to get on the podium, that’s OK.
‘If I do my best, and three others do that bit better, there’s nothing more I can give.’