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Time and place - Dame Kelly Holmes
The Sunday Times, 6 July 2008
The athlete Kelly Holmes, 38, recalls the house in South Africa where she lived and trained in the run-up to her double-gold success at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games and the relief of not having to train any more.
Interview by Emma Wells
The time I spent in Potchefstroom, South Africa, leading up to the 2004 Games in Athens, was so important. I knew it would be my last Olympics – I would be 34. Although I’d won a bronze in the 800 metres in Sydney in 2000, I knew I had to get it right.
I couldn’t have been more focused. I needed good running routes, a gym and great physios – and Potchefstroom, an hour and a half’s drive from Johannes-burg, had everything. The climate is perfect, and it’s a really quiet, old town, so I could concentrate on my training. It isn’t a big place, and so there were no distractions – I couldn’t go clubbing! It’s a university town, though, so there were a lot of nice young people around.
I had been going to South Africa since 1996, when I went to Pretoria to race. My manager at the time – [the late] Andy Norman, who was married to Fatima Whitbread – invited me to go to another race in Potchefstroom, and I ended up staying there for a bit and really liking it. The following year, I went to Cape Town and loved it, too, but it’s at sea level, and I needed the effects of training higher. For the next few years, I trained in Potchefstroom, and made some really good Afrikaans friends, whom I have stayed in touch with.
At the end of 2002 – the year I won gold in the Commonwealth Games 1,500 metres and bronze in the 800 metres at the European Championships – I decided to rent out my house near Tonbridge, Kent, and move to South Africa. The American coach Margot Jennings had said she would take me on, and I needed to get away from the distractions of the UK. Plus, house prices were really low and I’d never had real savings, so I thought I’d be stupid not to just go for it.
I returned to Potchefstroom and bought a house. It was a scary thing to do – being an athlete, your career is so volatile, you don’t know how long you need to stay. But the house really appealed to me. It was one storey, built in the 1960s of dark brick and textured stone. It had a long wall at the front and an electric gate; the big front garden was planted with herbs, trees, bushes and tropical flowers. The house was built in a square around an open courtyard with trees in it. There were five bedrooms, a large lounge, a big kitchen-diner (which I replaced – the original was rather old-fashioned) and a study.
There was a swimming pool outside with a barbecue. I let out rooms to German and French athletes. We used the outside space all the time – when you are in training, you don’t really go out much, so there were always people buzzing around. There was never any alcohol, although I do have the odd drink now. Fesbem, a Mozambican guy who helped in the house and garden, lived with me – at first in the house, then I had a place built for him. He was a fantastic guy. We spoke different languages, but we still managed to communicate.
My life was eating, sleeping, training, physio, massage and constant health checks. I’d had seven years of injury, so I couldn’t leave anything to chance: I didn’t rush the training, made sure I warmed up properly, cooled down properly, ate properly, rehydrated properly. I trained twice a day: circuits, weights, gym, pool, short runs, long runs, track work, field, cardiovascular training. Potchefstroom is a very flat town, but there were lovely runs along trails in the bush. I really looked at my food in terms of energy for training and recovery. At night, I watched a lot of movies – Shawshank Redemption and Shallow Hal were favourites.
It’s nice not have to do all that any more, but then it was exactly what I wanted. Having the house meant I could do exactly what I needed to and was relaxed and rested.
I decided to sell up after the Games, although I didn’t think I’d be retiring when I did, in 2005. I had an injury that year, and the struggle of it, the “here we go again” feeling made me think. A life event also forced the decision. I went to Ireland to be introduced to a businessman, Tim, who was looking at doing motivational work with young people there. He told me he had fallen over playing tennis the day before, and had banged his head and didn’t feel well, but he still seemed enthusiastic. When I returned to South Africa, I heard that he had died three weeks after our meeting. He’d had cancer, but didn’t know it. It was such a shock. I thought: “What’s the point in running when I’ve already achieved my life’s dream?”
I see the whole experience as part of my life journey, a time of doing, being and living. And a great opportunity.
The Dame Kelly Holmes Legacy Trust provides essential life skills to aspiring young athletes.