As Rio looms on the Beautiful Horizon of Brazilian camp, Marshall law feels good

28/07/2016

 

Not so much third time lucky but third time prepared is how Mel Marshall sees her third Olympic Games as Rio looms large on the Belo Horizonte (Beautiful horizon in Portuguese).

She’s been here before but not in the same place: Athens 2004, Beijing 2008 as a swimmer racing in Great Britain colours in the midst of a career that delivered a silver at world l/c champs, silver and bronze at world s/c champs, two gold, two silver and a brnze at European level and five silver, two bronze at the Commonwealth Games, all but one of those medals collected at Melbourne 2006.

Basically, she knows what it feels like; knows what its like to go into the Olympics ranked wold No 1 (200 free), make the final and come away with that as the prize. Life moves on, new challenge, new horizons.

For the bulk of the past two Olympic cycles, she’s been a coach and much of that time she’s had a boy-to-man called Adam Peaty working under her guidance. More on that as the day gets closer but suffice it to say, the partnership has worked. And how.

Now starts the craft of the coach at an Olympic Games but Marshall is among those who brings to her job on deck the experience of an athlete who was still a teen when Sydney 2000 unfolded and Anthony Ervinwas sharing dash gold with teammate Gary Hall Jr.

Now 34, the Boston-born, City of Derby pioneering coach of the year (first woman and first, then, to keep the crown) for Britain in 2014 and 2015, is, as nature would have it, still a year younger than Ervin as he races in Olympic waters once more – and only a couple of seasons older than Michael Phelps, Laszlo Csehand the thirtysomethings who will fly the flag of longevity in Rio for eight days from August 6.

Athlete-coach; different jobs, says Marshall, whose law has worked a treat: she’s been coach, guide, friend, support, funder, firm hand, maturity, smart swim mind and more to Peaty since before the moment he stood in a field while contemplating what Craig Benson had swum at London 2012 and pondered the place he found himself in. As he put it after making the Olympic team this past spring:

“I was literally ready to go out and get drunk in a field or something stupid like that. It was like a ‘what am I doing with my life? kind of moment. From then, I watched all the Olympics and said to myself that I would make the next one. That was my defining moment, to stop messing about and get my head down.”

Feet on ground, heart in the heavens, Peaty, world 50 and 100m breaststroke champion and a sub-58sec pioneer over two laps with his 57.92 two-lap stunner of a global standard from last year,  has been described by coach Marshall (images, courtesy of British Swimming and the BOA in Belo Horizonte) as a “gladiator, a warrior” and in these stirring terms:

“He is like a soldier going over the top of the trench. You can shoot at him and shoot at him and you will not stop him moving forward. We talked in our group about if we were soldiers, what role would everybody take. We said he would be the guy who had forgotten his gun and just knocked everybody out along the way. He is fearless.”

When you mention that he’s shown courage, what do you mean, I ask Marshall.

“If I said to Adam Peaty ‘you need 5x1500ms breaststroke every single day from now until Rio and it would guarantee you would swim fast’, he wouldn’t question it. He says ‘yes’ to everything; he comes in with a positive attitude every day; if I say ‘be there 10 minutes early’, he’s there 20 minutes early; if I say ‘we’re going again’, he’s like ‘yeah, we’re going again’. If he is hanging on the side [exhausted] he would just courageously go again.”

They’re beyond that now as far as training is concerned. Nine days out from the gun going off and the work was done a long while back; tractor tyres chucked and rolled, race-pace sets that sent pain coursing through nerve to muscle, mind and more. Now starts the craft of the coach at a Games. Says Marshall, through British Swimming in Belo Horizonte: “It’s a very different approach coming into an Olympic Games as a coach. I think the biggest change is an athlete goes to the Olympics looking to get as much as they possibly can out the Games – they train relentlessly to achieve their outcome and deserve everything that comes their way. In contrast, the role of the coach is about containing everything.

“As an athlete you want to be at your physical and mental best and to channel all of your energy and excitement towards that performance whereas for me, this time around, it’s about ensuring that everything remains calm and contained while absorbing any anxieties if they exist.”

Marshall is wedded to the romance of sport but applies logic and process to her mission:

“The way I view sport is a part of me that I do not want to lose but it’s all about balance and I try to ensure this in everything I do. When you’re part of the team you have to be someone different at certain times to certain people and that’s an important role. As an athlete I was always fully focused but never saw it as an individual sport. I was very team aware and that’s something that has helped me a lot with my role as a coach.”

Team concepts were a big part of Bill Sweetenham‘s philosophy as Marshall grew up in the sport and remain that under the current leadership of Bill Furniss and a team of coaches, away and home, that had steered the British shoal to a place of confidence without cockiness this past Olympic cycle since a home Games in London that certainly fell shy of where it might have been but was not the end-of-world disaster that made some rounds.

Marshall believes Great Britain to be a nation ready to step up in the prevailing conditions of fierce world competition wholly remote from a time when her nation quite ‘easily’ made top three on the overall medals table as women made their Olympic debut at Stockholm 1912 and just 17 countries took part, the USA finishing behind Germany, Austria and Britain on the medals.

A pioneer in her own right 104 years on, Marshall sees Britain’s place as solid heading into the 31st Games in Brazil next week:

“The camp here in Belo has been very relaxed. It’s been fun but focused and you can tell the athletes are at a good point. You look around the pool deck in training and you get a real sense that everyone is ready. The facility at UFMG is one of the best we’ve ever used and the BOA, UK Sport and the University have done an excellent job.

“You couldn’t have picked a better place and location to have the camp and fine tune over the final days before the Games.”

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