Jessica Ennis: Unbelievable - From My Childhood Dreams to Winning Olympic Gold

by Jessica Ennis

  The captaincy added to my media commitments ahead of the Europeans, and I was aware that my profile was rising, not least when Charles said I would be the only athlete judged a failure if I did not win gold in Spain.

  ‘I will still be young in 2012, only twenty-six, but you have a shelf life in the heptathlon,’ I told The Times that day in Barcelona. ‘The body can only take so much. It’s all the training no one sees. Eventually, the body says it’s had enough. I don’t know whether that will be after 2012, and what happens afterwards also depends on whether I’ve achieved everything I’ve wanted to. I just want to feel satisfied. I think you know when that is.’

  My shelf life as the ‘Leader’, the bib they give to the heptathlete who heads the rankings after each event, was threatened in Barcelona. Dobrynska had turned up in great shape and I expected it to be close. In the end it came down to a matter of inches.

  The nerves and stress were bubbling before the hurdles. Chernova was one of two girls to false-start in my heat. It meant that anyone else false-starting would be disqualified and out of the running. In those circumstances you tell yourself to stay in the blocks. Don’t go until the gun. Sometimes, though, as I would find out to my cost in the future, your subconscious takes over.

  I got out fast, was smooth over the hurdles and clocked 12.95 seconds. It was a good start and I backed it up with 1.89 metres in the high jump. It had been raining that morning so I was happy enough, but Dobrynska was fighting hard. She is far more powerful in the shot and so my lead was trimmed to just 11 points after three events. Whereas many events are seriously weakened at the Europeans because of the lack of American and Caribbean athletes, the heptathlon was a line-up of all the top girls, with the exception of Fountain. It was hard, fast and gruelling. I made up more points in the 200 metres, clocking 23.21 seconds, but I knew Dobrynska could strike back at me in the long jump and javelin. It had never been closer.

  It was the same on day two. I was still unconvinced by my long jump. Everyone told me that I should be able to jump much further because of my speed on the runway, but it just was not happening. Somewhere in me, though, is that competitive gene, the attention-seeking bit that thrives on the pressure and the big stage. Dobrynska laid down a marker by jumping a season’s best of 6.56 metres, but I responded with 6.43 metres on my last jump. The damage had been limited. I’d done the same in the shot put, saving the best until last, all those sessions with John and the wagers struck for chocolate paying off.

  Dobrynska was not giving up, though. She managed her best-ever javelin throw, 49.25 metres, to keep snapping away at my heels. I also threw better than ever, reaching 46.71 metres, and when the scores were totted up and sums done, I basically knew she had to beat me by two seconds in the 800 metres. My parents had come out to Spain and this was the first major championships they had been to. Andy was also there and so was Carmel, who watched my javelin and swiftly brought me back down to earth by saying: ‘Blimey, you can actually throw now.’

  I could have tucked in behind Dobrynska in the 800 metres and tracked her, making sure the gap never grew into a defeat, or I could have gone out and run hard from the front. I chose the latter. It’s the way I like to run. I am small and don’t want to get beaten up. I hit the front and, instead, Dobrynska tracked me. I could see her on the big screen. On the penultimate bend she made her move and edged past me. I was not having that and responded. I knew that I needed to run 2 minutes 9.59 seconds to break Denise’s British record at last. I saw off Dobrynska and crossed the line in 2.10.18. The winning margin was 45 points which equates to about three inches in the long jump. It had been a competition of broad scope and fine margins.

  It felt amazing. I was the world and European champion. There was only one thing missing now, and the talk of London increased even though it was two years away. I joined up with Andy, my family, and the team and went down Las Ramblas. It was late and there were a dozen of us so it was hard to get in anywhere. We ended up outside a tapas bar but they said it was full. I was tired, hungry and felt annihilated. A TV screen hung on a wall inside and it flashed to my 800 metres. Andy started pointing at me.

  ‘That’s her, it’s her,’ he said.

  The man looked at the screen and then at me. He paused for a second while he made the connection.

  ‘Come in,’ he said.

  It wasn’t the only door that would be opened on the back of a gold medal.

  8

  THE BIG TIME

  It was a letter I got at the end of 2010 that showed me there is another, less welcome side to being in the public eye. I was one of many athletes who chose not to go to the Commonwealth Games, staged in Delhi in October 2010. The reason was simple. They were being held far too late in the year. My year is built around the major summer championships and training blocks are geared to that, so travelling to India in October was going to throw everything out of synch.

  There were all sorts of problems in the build-up to Delhi and some people were portrayed as cowards for not competing there. For me, though, it had nothing to do with security, dengue fever, dodgy safety certificates or falling footbridges. It was just bad timing.

  One man did not see it that way. He sent me a very long letter explaining how disappointed he was and how I was letting the whole country down. How could I turn down the opportunity to represent my country? He was clearly someone who would die for England and he raged on. ‘I will not be supporting you in 2012,’ he concluded. I found that upsetting.

  There have been other messages, including a few about death. One man said he wanted to take Myla out for a walk and spoke about us walking on a beach and dying together. That got reported to the police. There are others that are a bit creepy. Generally, I try to take them lightly and with a bit of humour, but Andy gets worried. There can also be a few intense and, at times, rather creepy people around the tracks too. Maybe it is the fact that it’s a sport where women do not wear a great deal. I find that the best policy is to be respectful and polite wherever possible, while Jane generally tried to keep anything odd away from me.

  Generally, though, I get nice letters. After Berlin I received lots of lovely messages from kids addressed simply to ‘Jessica Ennis, World Champion’. There would be autograph requests and homemade cards. I was touched.

  People are usually nice and the opportunities that winning the world and European titles brought were beyond a Sheffield schoolgirl’s dreams. So when Adidas asked Jane if I would like to go to Los Angeles to do a photo-shoot with David Beckham, she said yes immediately and added that she would need to come too.

  Andy also came along as chaperone and we flew out to a lovely boutique hotel, the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood. It was a haven for proper stars rather than a Yorkshire heptathlete. In one corner sat Usher, the R&B megastar, flanked by huge bodyguards. I said hello and was unashamedly starry-eyed. Apparently, there was a recording studio at the hotel and Cheryl Cole was also staying there.

  On the day of the shoot we were driven up into the Hollywood hills to a huge glass-fronted mansion that looked out over the city. I sat in a room with David Beckham’s hair and make-up people and then I did my shoot. There was an air of expectancy as we awaited his arrival. When he did come, he politely shook everyone’s hand and asked how we were. He had an aura and I could feel everyone staring at him, but I imagine he is used to it. We did some pictures together and he showed me his scar from his Achilles injury. He was as nice and grounded as anyone you’ll meet. His music was playing in the house through his iPod. When a song came on that had some swearing in it, he rushed in and told someone to change it because his kids were around. I noticed how his kids tore all over the grounds, pursued by bodyguards, and could not imagine how he managed to live like that and remain so normal. I had experienced it on a tiny scale, but he could not go anywhere in the world without someone checking the house and watching over his kids. I thought it must be a weird life, but he was so approachable and normal and I liked him a lot. Some celebritie
s are only interested in their own worlds, but he asked me about training and injuries and then told me he wanted more kids. If I’d been a journalist it would have been a world exclusive, and I remember thinking how open he had been. I have since grown to realize that sportspeople have a real respect for one another and a mutual trust.

  With the gold medals came some fantastic sponsorship opportunities, particularly with the Olympic ones, and I began to do more photo-shoots. One of the first was at Forgemasters, the steelworks just down the road from where I train. The theme was simple enough, me being forged of Sheffield steel, but the shoot was more problematic. Obviously, it was blindingly hot in there and one man had the task of literally making sparks fly as the camera clicked. It was a normal day’s work for the men there, and so it was slightly odd to be standing there in a fairly skimpy athletics kit, with a throng of men in goggles looking on. As the sparks flew I thought, ‘This is a bit close’, and it was not the safest environment for a wannabe Olympic athlete, with metal strips lying around the floor, but the pictures were great.

  If Chell would have cringed at that one, he would have had kittens when I was driven out into the Derbyshire countryside to do some pictures for Vogue. The idea for this one was for me to wear a lovely white dress and heels and stand on a rocky outcrop overlooking a valley. It sounded simple enough, but what the pictures did not show was that I was literally on the edge of a sheer drop and it was very windy.

  ‘I’m not really comfortable with this,’ I said, but I did it anyway, despite the wind that was whipping up and the crew of lighting men and assistants who were gathered around the edge to catch me if I fell. Nobody told Chell, of course, and the pictures were suitably dramatic.

  I am like a lot of women in that I love fashion and being pampered, although glamour shoots can sometimes be a bit of a contradiction in terms. When I did a shoot for Marie Claire, the very vivacious and absolutely lovely American photographer spent his time saying, ‘Oh my God, darling’, before the shoot culminated in me leaning over a hurdle and a bunch of people chucking bottles of water at me. I loved the pictures but was soaking wet and had to get the train back north to Sheffield with my hair dripping. Another time I did a shoot for Stylist magazine. This one involved having red, white and blue powder paint blown in my face through straws. I ended up with powder in my ears and up my nose and got plenty of stares from people who thought my hair was caked in blood as I rushed for another train. The cover would be amazing, though, and so I felt it had been worth it.

  I think it’s important to try new things and take advantage of opportunities, but I never took my eye off the prize. I also have limits. I did some sexier shots for GQ magazine, wearing some hot-pants and pouting. My mum rang me when she saw them. ‘Young lady, you didn’t tell me about that, did you?’ Andy gets the mickey taken out of him at work for it, but I would never do topless or nude pictures or even be body-painted. That is where I draw the line. I have really enjoyed this side of my life. Having make-up artists and stylists dress me and famed photographers shoot me for ad campaigns or magazines is the thing that many girls dream of, and is a far cry from traipsing around sweaty sports centres in a tracksuit.

  Life was certainly changing and I was engaged by now. That happened on Christmas Eve. Normally we go to the local pub, the Robin Hood, on Christmas Eve, but this time we were off to an Italian restaurant. Andy and I had spoken about marriage but I had no inkling that anything was happening when he called me into our front room and asked me to sit down. I thought that was odd and then realized what was happening, but tempered the excitement by thinking he could not possibly have a ring. He spoke a bit about how we had been seeing each other for a long time now and I thought, ‘This is it.’ By the time he got down on one knee I could tell how nervous he was, but I was so happy. We called Mum and Carmel who both screamed their consent down the phone. Dad already knew because Andy had asked to see him the day before and asked his permission. I think Dad was relieved when that was all he wanted. It made for a great Christmas and made up for the time Andy had got a bit worse for wear, danced on the living-room table and fallen headfirst into the Christmas tree, putting a huge dent in the present I had bought for Grandad and lovingly wrapped.

  There was never any question of getting married before the Olympics. I could not fully enjoy it beforehand because I had this big weight looming over everything. I thought the dream would be to win the Olympics and then have time to plan the wedding. Chell came around and I expected him to tell me straightaway that the wedding was off until after London, but he gave me a congratulations card and seemed very happy for us.

  It was a good start to the year, but things rarely stayed smooth for long. I started the 2011 season at the Northern Athletics Indoor Championships at the EIS in Sheffield. A week later I clocked 8.03 seconds for the 60 metres hurdles and then dropped that time to 7.97 seconds at the Aviva International in Glasgow. It was a light start to the year, the phoney war if you like, as I targeted the European Indoor Championships in Paris in March.

  The Olympic schedule was released that February. Chell had had some discussions about organizing the schedule so that I could do the hurdles as well as the heptathlon. I have always liked the hurdles more than any other single event, and sometimes watch the specialists turn up, run their race and go home with a degree of envy. It looks so simple and, when your body is crying out in pain the day after doing seven events, very tempting. However, the schedule only had one day between the end of the heptathlon and the hurdles heats and so I felt it was too little recovery time. It was never really on my radar from that moment.

  I went back to the EIS for the European trials. I had planned to do a few events, but only got through the shot put, my worst of the year, and the high jump before I knew something was wrong. UK Athletics issued a press release saying it was just precautionary and we thought it was, but the pain in the Achilles would fester on and refuse to go away. Before long I accepted I would have to pull out of Paris. The UKA doctor thought I had torn my calf and that the blood was dripping down and pooling near the Achilles. The pain was not too bad and I felt I could have gone to France if my life depended on it, but I was looking at the bigger picture.

  I could not run or jump. Hurdling was out. I was stressing now because it kept nagging away. I did my rehab, as I’d grown used to under Ali, but there was confusion about what was wrong. I went to London to see an Achilles specialist and he did an ultrasound. He told me that the problem was the plantaris tendon that runs alongside the Achilles. He said that not everyone had it and, basically, we had evolved and it was now redundant. It was like the appendix. He suggested he went in and snipped it.

  The talk of operations scared me because I’d never had one. How will I heal? What if it gets infected? What if the doctor’s wrong? I was against it and, luckily, Chell, Derry and Ali felt the same way. It’s easy to accept what doctors say unquestioningly, but we decided to do it our way.

  Ali did lots of work on the calf and I did all I was told, but the weeks continued to tick by with little progress. For someone who hates missing even a single session that was hard. Desperate times called for desperate measures and so I tried cryotherapy. That meant I had to go to Champneys Tring health resort and enter an ice chamber where temperatures are kept at minus 135°C to aid blood circulation. After a minute in there I went into a second chamber, which was a steady minus 90°C, for a couple more.

  It felt like the indoor season was causing me problems and I always seemed to come away with something. I heard a story about another girl who had the same issue. She had the operation and got back to the top of her game very quickly. I wondered if I should have done the same. In all I had seven weeks out, during which time I flew to Orlando for an Adidas shoot and was so frustrated to watch the likes of Tyson Gay, the top American sprinter, doing his track sessions, while I had a bunch of boring rehab exercises to do in the gym. I was cranky and impatient at not being able to run and, for me, seven weeks seemed a lifeti
me. Later Chell told me that the girl who’d had the operation had broken down with a ruptured Achilles. I felt very relieved that I had not chosen the same route.

  I made my comeback in May 2011, three months after I had last performed. I went to the Great City Games in Manchester, an outdoors event where they erect a track down Deansgate, the main thoroughfare in the city centre, and let you run by the shops and punters. It is novel but a good way of trying to get more people into the sport, although I had no such worthy aims when I turned up. I just wanted to prove to myself that I was going to be able to make it to Götzis in a fortnight, because I desperately needed to do a heptathlon before the World Championships, which were being held in Daegu in South Korea and beginning in August.

  It was grey and miserable in Manchester, but I got through. I was happy with my 100 metres hurdles time of 12.88 seconds, my fourth fastest, and less so with my 150 metres, but I was in one piece. ‘She should have got well and truly spanked given the lack of training,’ Chell said to the media.

  It was a gamble going to Götzis with barely six weeks’ training done. Because I’d been planning an indoor season, where there is no javelin, and then got injured, I’d had little time to work on that event. I had also become something of a dream freak in the meantime. I had one and looked up the meaning in my book and it seemed really significant. It said if you dream this, then you will never achieve your goal. There was a caveat, though, and it said if it also involved something specific, like a flower with a petal missing, which it did, then you’d work hard and get everything you want. Sometimes I felt as if I was grasping at straws.

  Everybody was in Götzis in May. It was the dry-run before Daegu where I would put my world title on the line. I was worried and anxious, but I actually felt in brilliant running shape. Maybe sometimes you need a break and, when you are an athlete, you don’t allow yourself that. I sat in my small hotel room, with a box of Jaffa cakes, box set of Grey’s Anatomy and the tube holding my javelins, and counted down.