Get set for Rio’s Super Saturday!
Aura of our big three just too much for rivals
’M not sure the term ‘Super Saturday’ really did justice to what happened in British sport on August 4, 2012. It was Britain’s best day in 104 years of Olympic competition.
We won six golds and one silver. Started in the morning with rowing, then cycling gold in the afternoon and finished the most incredible day in British athletics history with that amazing evening at London’s Olympic Stadium.
Jessica Ennis — as she was then — won the heptathlon, Greg Rutherford the long jump and Mo Farah the 10,000m. Remarkably, they could all do it again tomorrow night in Rio. If it all goes right then we may need a new adjective for Saturdays.
But my question is: how are these guys the world’s best when they are nowhere near the world record in their events? The answer is that all three are unbelievable competitors. They know how to win and in a championship — particularly an Olympic Games which happens only every four years — that is a massive advantage. I would take that over talent any day. It’s an innate quality and these three have it running through them.
I always knew if I was in great shape then I could enjoy being in great shape when I competed. These three have the same effect on other competitors. It has been a long, long time since Jess, Mo or Greg had a bad race or event when it really mattered.
When you come back as defending champion everybody around you gives you a lot more respect.
If you have already been Olympic champion you know what it takes.
Many people have only got one shot at Olympic glory, after all. That’s what makes the Games so special: one opportunity, the single chance you have been training towards for four years — and you can’t mess it up.
I don’t think having a baby has been a bad thing for Jess in terms of her athletics career. There are a lot of people coming back after becoming mums now. Of course she will want to spend time with her son Reggie, but I think it might make her stronger physically.
She’s done really well since she has come back, but she has been fortunate that the heptathlon hasn’t moved on in her absence. She’s not in the shape she was in 2012 but that doesn’t matter because she’s still the one to beat.
Some of her rivals will look across the call room and see Jessica EnnisHill, Olympic champion, and think she has an aura about her. But somebody a few years younger, like Katarina Johnson-Thompson, will still think she’s got a chance. Like Jess and Kat, I had a couple of guys I knew among the decathletes because I competed against them all the time. You pass the time of day with people but mainly you just keep your eye on the clock.
You are constantly thinking about when the next event starts and when you should be eating or drinking. I probably spent most of the time looking at my spikes, checking them over and over again.
I thrived on the atmosphere in those rooms between the different events of the decathlon, though. I like people-watching. And I liked seeing how people responded.
You could tell a lot about people from how they reacted. Experience told me I could gauge a lot from other athletes’ body language in those hours between events.
Kat is capable of getting a medal if she can string it together, but it depends on what she has learned from what happened in Beijing at last year’s World Championships when she recorded three fouls in the long jump.
Some of her events can be brilliant but they’re not the ones she needs to be working on. The only thing that could threaten Jess is if somebody like Kat pulls an outstanding javelin or shot put out of the bag and excels in one of her weaker events.
I think Jess has been underplaying her hand. She’s told us how tough it’s been having a baby and how she’s longed to be with her son instead of training. She’s played it really well, but she is determined to be a double Olympic champion and it is well within her grasp.
Greg. How wrong I was about Greg! I didn’t think he was very good going into London 2012, but he’s done brilliantly. What he has managed to do is make sure he is the best jumper on the day even if he’s not the furthest jumper in the field. He has maximised his talent.
He will go down as one of the great jumpers and yet he’s nowhere near the furthest jumper. But you underestimate him as a competitor at your peril. He comes up with the distance he needs on the day. He picks the right time to do it.
The guys who have jumped further have failed when it matters and it has been Greg who has won the Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth titles.
You don’t always get the best weather or perfect conditions and that can make a difference. But not to Greg. I think he’ll try to put one down early and then everybody else will be under massive pressure.
Mo has had a really good year. He’s running fast. You need two things as a distance-runner: good stamina and pretty good speed. He has got both and he’s so confident at the moment. He’s so good they’ll have to trip him up to beat him, but Mo’s still got to do it.
The 10,000 metres is easier because there’s no qualifying round — it’s a straight final on Saturday night — and that makes the 5,000m easier because it will be one less race.
His competitors will be looking at him and thinking: ‘Oh my God, we’ve tried everything. What can we do to beat this guy?’
I want to see plenty of British medals in athletics, obviously, but also that things are changing for the better in our sport. People are getting fed up with hearing about doping. We want to be transported to that magical place that only elite sport can take us.
But we need to be able to believe in that magic, and at the moment it’s being taken away. That’s the beauty of sport, isn’t it? You see an archer land an arrow and think: ‘How did they do that?’ At the moment it feels like you then find out the bullseye is the size of a bed.
It has been great to see athletes coming out and saying how bad doping is. I’m proud of all of them; swimmers like Michael Phelps and Lilly King who are standing up.
The IOC aren’t listening but maybe if more athletes speak out then they will have to start.
Let’s hope some of that old Super Saturday magic — in what remains the greatest Olympic sport — will help heal the wounds.