Reluctant superstar Laura Trott is back on track and after Chris Hoy Double Olympic champion discusses her tears, fears and burning ambition to beat the Scot's gold-medal tally
It was three months after becoming a double Olympic champion that Laura Trott broke down in tears but unlike in the velodrome last summer they were not of joy. The London Games were over, the celebrations had ended but the show had to go on.
"I just burst out crying. I didn't know whether I was coming or going. I think I was low, coming to terms with starting over again. After the Games I only took 10 days off; I didn't stop," she says. "At the Glasgow World Cup I was thinking: 'Oh god, this is terrible.' It was crap; people kept saying: 'But you won, blah, blah, blah.' But winning is different to feeling like you actually want to be there."
Trott is normally a vivacious character but, when speaking to her during her training camp with the Wiggle Honda road team last week, it seemed that she had been waiting to get these feelings off her chest for some time. Her exuberance and sparkle remain, but now those natural traits seem more measured and disguised under a layer of trepidation.
"Right before Glasgow I almost had enough. The team was changing; Jo [Rowsell] decided that she didn't want to do the team pursuit any more and it really affected me. It's not the fact that I don't like change, but it all happened so quickly. I thought: 'I didn't commit for this.'"
Things are back on track for the 20-year-old, but it got worse before it improved. The nadir came at the Track World Championships in Minsk, when Trott won silver in the omnium behind her Olympic rival Sarah Hammer and question marks over her mental approach were raised by the coach, Shane Sutton.
"I wasn't going as well as I wanted to. We did everything that I normally do but it was little things in the buildup that didn't go well. I felt like I was trying – I wanted to win and I felt that I had as much drive as I always do, but some of the coaches said I wasn't the same as I was during the Olympics and last year's worlds," she says.
"I don't think I went out as good as I could have been. I went to Australia and trained for five weeks; I was flying. I came back and I wasn't very well for ages, I didn't train for almost two weeks. Then my form began to come through, but not as good as it has done in the past.
"It's draining isn't it? It's draining just doing the race, but getting all your emotions attached is draining as well. Shane Sutton said to me that I wasn't the same. I can kind of see what he meant because after we won the team pursuit, although I felt that I was happy, I couldn't really show it or express it. It took me forever to actually celebrate and go up to my mum and dad. The Olympics was such a high and we focused on it for two-and-a-half years, with the worlds before as stepping stones in between. This time it was like, what are these stepping stones towards? It felt different and a bit weird.
"I was like, I'm trying, I'm committed to this and of course I want to win. It does frustrate me a little bit because I'm not the same person, I can't win everything and I can't just switch the way I feel and be the person I was eight months ago. I don't think my speed was there either, which was beginning to frustrate me and that has a knock-on effect."
Trott was under the spotlight before London 2012 but her fame spiralled after she clinched the team pursuit victory alongside Dani King and Joanna Rowsell, to go with her omnium gold. Admitting it was "nuts" to travel past a giant image of herself emblazoned on the side of Stratford's Westfield shopping centre en route to training every day, the pitfalls of becoming a well-known public figure have taken their toll.
"I've bought a house up north near Stockport, but when I go back to my mum and dad's I just hate the attention. If the dog runs out I'm like 'oh no' because it means I have to run out and get it. When I'm packing the car and putting my bike in the car I'm like quick, quick because people stop me and everything just takes so much longer," she says.
Reluctant superstar Laura Trott is back on track and after Chris Hoy
Double Olympic champion discusses her tears, fears and burning ambition to beat the Scot's gold-medal tally
Email
Laura Trott wins gold in the women's omnium at the London Olympic Games. Photograph: Tom Jenkins
"I just burst out crying. I didn't know whether I was coming or going. I think I was low, coming to terms with starting over again. After the Games I only took 10 days off; I didn't stop," she says. "At the Glasgow World Cup I was thinking: 'Oh god, this is terrible.' It was crap; people kept saying: 'But you won, blah, blah, blah.' But winning is different to feeling like you actually want to be there."
Trott is normally a vivacious character but, when speaking to her during her training camp with the Wiggle Honda road team last week, it seemed that she had been waiting to get these feelings off her chest for some time. Her exuberance and sparkle remain, but now those natural traits seem more measured and disguised under a layer of trepidation.
"Right before Glasgow I almost had enough. The team was changing; Jo [Rowsell] decided that she didn't want to do the team pursuit any more and it really affected me. It's not the fact that I don't like change, but it all happened so quickly. I thought: 'I didn't commit for this.'"
Things are back on track for the 20-year-old, but it got worse before it improved. The nadir came at the Track World Championships in Minsk, when Trott won silver in the omnium behind her Olympic rival Sarah Hammer and question marks over her mental approach were raised by the coach, Shane Sutton.
"I wasn't going as well as I wanted to. We did everything that I normally do but it was little things in the buildup that didn't go well. I felt like I was trying – I wanted to win and I felt that I had as much drive as I always do, but some of the coaches said I wasn't the same as I was during the Olympics and last year's worlds," she says.
"I don't think I went out as good as I could have been. I went to Australia and trained for five weeks; I was flying. I came back and I wasn't very well for ages, I didn't train for almost two weeks. Then my form began to come through, but not as good as it has done in the past.
"It's draining isn't it? It's draining just doing the race, but getting all your emotions attached is draining as well. Shane Sutton said to me that I wasn't the same. I can kind of see what he meant because after we won the team pursuit, although I felt that I was happy, I couldn't really show it or express it. It took me forever to actually celebrate and go up to my mum and dad. The Olympics was such a high and we focused on it for two-and-a-half years, with the worlds before as stepping stones in between. This time it was like, what are these stepping stones towards? It felt different and a bit weird.
"I was like, I'm trying, I'm committed to this and of course I want to win. It does frustrate me a little bit because I'm not the same person, I can't win everything and I can't just switch the way I feel and be the person I was eight months ago. I don't think my speed was there either, which was beginning to frustrate me and that has a knock-on effect."
Trott was under the spotlight before London 2012 but her fame spiralled after she clinched the team pursuit victory alongside Dani King and Joanna Rowsell, to go with her omnium gold. Admitting it was "nuts" to travel past a giant image of herself emblazoned on the side of Stratford's Westfield shopping centre en route to training every day, the pitfalls of becoming a well-known public figure have taken their toll.
"I've bought a house up north near Stockport, but when I go back to my mum and dad's I just hate the attention. If the dog runs out I'm like 'oh no' because it means I have to run out and get it. When I'm packing the car and putting my bike in the car I'm like quick, quick because people stop me and everything just takes so much longer," she says.
"People genuinely just want to have a talk and have a chat, but I have a life that I need to get on with and I need to be in Manchester in two hours. My dad says: 'Laura, you can't be like that with people,' but for me I haven't changed and I'm exactly the same person. It's crazy how many requests I'm getting. My agent reckons he gets 60 requests a day and I'm like: 'What, are people really that interested in me?'"
A fresh challenge presents itself this week in the form of Wiggle Honda, the British women's professional road cycling team in its debut season in the sport. Trott and her fellow Olympic track champions, King and Rowsell, are among the team's star names, and with backing from the Bradley Wiggins Foundation, the team, run by Rochelle Gilmor, a 31-year-old Australian rider, mean business. Trott's first ride for the Belgium-based team is at Dottignies in the Tour of Flanders on Monday. But whichever country she is in the attention will not disappear if she can rediscover her fine form of last season.
Slowly as our conversation progresses, her ambition begins to resurface. Casting her mind back to the glorious scenes of last summer sparks a reinvigoration in her tone. The period since the Olympics might have been difficult, but perhaps a dip in intensity was inevitable after focusing on one event for such a sustained period of time.
"I've watched the omnium back on DVD and I still get sweaty palms, even though I know I'm going to win every time I watch it. The atmosphere was amazing; we tried to prepare for it but I just don't think anything will ever match that. It was just mad; everyone wanted you to win. It almost didn't feel like they were there to watch you win, but they were there to watch you.
"Now all the good feelings are coming back and I'm like: 'What was I thinking?' I thought after the worlds I can focus on the roads; there is less pressure and I can just go out there to enjoy it. I've been looking forward to racing on the road for ages, getting stuck in and doing something completely different.
"I can go in with the mentality that if I crash, then whatever. If I break my arm this year it doesn't matter whereas last year when I crashed and had stitches in my chin I thought: 'Right, that's it.' It wasn't worth it because I wanted to go to the Olympics so much."
Maybe it was her and boyfriend Jason Kenny's new dog Sprolo that proved the catalyst for a change in spirit. But, more likely, Trott's emotional rollercoaster is something that many of the athletes who represented Great Britain in London will have experienced.
Her future, though, could be huge. While the focus has not yet turned to the Rio Olympics in 2016, her ambition is now stronger than ever. She has her eyes set on becoming the most decorated Olympian in Britain's history, an honour currently bestowed on Sir Chris Hoy, who has six gold medals to his name. At 20, Trott has time on her side and, after riding out the storm, she has emerged stronger, wiser and more determined.
"I hope that's not it and I'm not always looking back," she says. "I've got an attitude that I want to win, it doesn't matter what it is. Obviously my heart lies on the track and I want six gold medals.
"I was thinking about it; I've won two already and if they change the events at the next one but the omnium stays in I could win three, so that's five. So I'd only have to win one at the next Olympics and I've equalled him. I just want to win more and more."I want to win everything; I want to win as many as Chris Hoy has. Seven would be nice, lucky number seven."
No comments:
Post a Comment