O’Connor: Fellow sufferer Redgrave inspired me
As Siobhan-Marie O’Connor discovered, it is good to talk. O’Connor, who won a silver medal in the 200m individual medley on Tuesday night, suffers from ulcerative colitis, a bowel condition whose effects are far more debilitating than plain embarrassment.
When O’Connor competed at London 2012 as a 16 year-old the condition was undiagnosed. Her parents, Sean and Lindsey, were told her weight loss was a result of stress from a pretty unique combination of taking your GCSEs while preparing for a home Olympics.
“We look back on a picture when she first qualified for the Olympics on the front page of The Sunday
Telegraph and she looked like a ghost,” Mark said. “We look back on that and think, ‘Why didn’t we realise that something was wrong?’ ”
When the diagnosis came, further questions arose, not least whether she could keep competing as an elite swimmer. The fears proved unfounded. Several sports stars, from former England rugby captain Lewis Moody to ex-Manchester United footballer Darren Fletcher, have had successful careers despite the condition.
Yet the poster boy of conquering colitis is Britain’s greatest-ever rower, Sir Steve Redgrave. And last year, British Swimming arranged for him and O’Connor to meet. What she thought would be a brief chat turned into a two-hour conversation and she left inspired that her condition need not be an obstacle to an Olympic medal.
“It was one of the best days of my life,” O’Connor said. “He is a sporting legend, so for him to come to talk things through with me made me feel so much better with what I have.
“It is not a problem. Everyone in sport has something to deal with, whether a long-term injury or anything else. I have an amazing team around me to control it as best I can.
“He just shows that you can do what you want. He has been through it and he is the best Olympian ever. It shows you can get through it, that was the biggest message.”
O’Connor finished behind Hungary’s self-proclaimed “Iron Lady”, Katinka Hosszu, in a British-record time of 2 min 06.88 sec. Given that Hosszu is 27 – and setting all man- ner of world records so late in her career – and O’Connor is 20, it may not be long before she is at the top of swimming’s food chain.
Soon after O’Connor’s race there was a moment of redemption for James Guy in the 200m freestyle relay. Guy is world champion at 200m but could only finish fourth in the individual final. Yet he came back to swim a fantastic anchor leg to steer the team of Stephen Milne, Duncan Scott and Daniel Wallace to their own silver medal behind the US.
“I was devastated after the fourth place,” Guy said. “Honestly I cried. I saw my mum and dad and I just collapsed. But I moved on and said, ‘Now I am going to do the country proud in the relay’. I knew I was getting faster and stronger and I did.”