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The athlete’s journey: transitions through sport
The athlete’s journey: transitions through sport

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1 The need for a life outside sport

As you saw in Session 2, research has shown that having a strong athletic identity can make some career transitions such as retirement or injury more difficult (e.g. Murdock et al., 2016). It was suggested that athletes should develop aspects of their life outside sport to help them cope with future transitions. You will explore this further in the next activity.

Activity 1 Life outside sport

Timing: Allow about 25 minutes

Watch the two videos below in which Hannah Cockcroft (athletics) and Nekoda Smythe-Davis (judo) talk about the importance of developing a life outside sport. As you watch, make a note of the areas of their lives they developed beyond competing in their sports and the benefits they felt they gained from doing so. Then think about how this might impact on you or any athletes you support – what might you do differently having watched these videos?

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[MUSIC PLAYING]

[TEXT ON SCREEN: Hannah Cockcroft is the current World and European champion, a world record holder and multiple Paralympic gold medallist. Hannah is a #More2Me champion.]

HANNAH COCKCROFT:
When I got involved with wheelchair racing, I never-- it was never a dream. I never wanted to be a Paralympian, so I always had different interests and different hobbies going on around that. I still went to college. I still went to sixth form, got my A-levels, got a degree at college, went to university. I just always had something else fitted in there, because I found that the moment athletics grew, the more I kind of wanted that distraction.
I think it's really important to have something else outside of your sport that you can go away and focus on. For me, it's just about having two channels. So I've got my athletics channel, and I love athletics. I love my training. It's the most important thing in the world to me.
But I found, going into London 2012 when all I was was an athlete, I just found that I got bored. Training didn't-- it didn't switch me on like it should do. It didn't feel like the most important thing in the world. Because I was doing it. I was eating, sleeping, everything was around training. And so my coach encouraged me. He encouraged me to go to university, just to add that a little bit of extra something back in so that I could have that change of channels.
Post 2012, I decided that I wanted to move into television and media studies. I wanted to work in the media somehow. And off the back of that, I worked really hard with my lifestyle advisor. So I went and studied journalism at university, and then, we just recently completed a presenting course. And then that got me my first ever job on BBC Countryfile.
My interests are really, really simple. Music-- I love going to concerts and gigs, and love just live music. I go to the cinema. I go shopping. They're not massive interests. But I obviously don't have loads of time for something time consuming. So for me, it's just finding that little thing that I can switch off from my training and just go into normal person mode, as it were.
I think if an athlete or a coach came to me and said they don't want any other interest outside sport. They want to be totally focused. Ultimately, it's a personal decision. You decide what you want to do outside of sport. But my advice to them would be that if you are so focused on one thing, then you're never going to grow as a person. And you're never really going to build a life outside of sport. And eventually for us all, we're all going to have to end sport. And it's going to be a lot sooner than retirement age.
It doesn't have to distract you. It can work really well alongside your sport as long as it's the right thing.
I think my message to any athlete coming into sport-- but also any athlete that's already in sport that's maybe struggling to find that balance-- is to just go out and try things. For me, everything that I've tried has just come up as an opportunity. And I've always been brought up to think that if you don't take that opportunity, you'll never know whether you enjoyed it or whether you didn't. And the thing is you never lose anything by taking opportunities.
Yes, I'm Hannah the athlete. I love to train, and training's what I do. But you have to find something else that lets your body and your mind rest from that. You don't want to be constantly thinking about 800-meter tactics. You need to go out-- even if it's something simple like going out with your friends, going for a meal, going to cinema. Or if it's something bigger like continuing your education or finding a part-time job-- whatever it is.
I know that my lifestyle advisor's always there to lean on and to support me in making the right decision. And I know that everyone else's will do that too.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

[TEXT ON SCREEN: Outside of sport Hannah is a keen baker having appeared on Channel 4’s Celebrity Bake Off. She’s also an aspiring TV presenter having already presented on BBC’s Countryfile. Meanwhile Hannah is in full-time training as she heads towards the 2020 Paralympic Games. #More2Me. For more information go to: https://www.eis2win.co.uk/service/performance-lifestyle/]

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Transcript: Video 2

[MUSIC PLAYING]

[TEXT ON SCREEN: Nekoda Smythe-Davis is a judo Commonwealth champion and World Championships Silver and Bronze medallist. Nekoda is a #More2Me champion.]

NEKODA SMYTHE-DAVIS:
It's really tough when you're a sports person, an elite athlete. It takes up all of your time, and it's all you ever think about. As soon as you wake up in the morning, it's I've got to go training. I've got to eat right. I've got to rest right. So it is difficult. But I find for me personally that if I just did sport, I'd probably go stir crazy. I have to do other things.
In judo, we work in Olympic cycles. And I would say for the Rio cycle, everything was new. Everything was the first time I was preparing for the Olympics. So all I could think about was going to the Olympics. All I could think about was preparing right, and I found it very hard to switch off. I didn't really do that much outside of judo in the Rio cycle. And you become really obsessive, and some of those behaviors aren't always healthy.

[TEXT ON SCREEN: After Rio 2016, along with support from her EIS Performance Lifestyle advisor, Nekoda decidely to actively plan for life after sport...]

NEKODA SMYTHE-DAVIS:
Obviously, I'm getting older, and I'm more experienced. And I decided that if I was going to go on this journey again and try and qualify for the Olympics, this possibly could be my last. And I started to think about life after sport. What do I do when I finish in Tokyo? Where do I go next?
After Rio, I was potentially thinking of starting university and we spoke about the pros and cons of taking on a course and whether I'd have enough time. And we actually decided that maybe if I leveled up in my judo course and did the level three, then it puts me in a really good position. After Tokyo, I could actually do the level four, which is a degree-- which is amazing. I don't have to go to uni for three or four years. I can actually get a degree another way.
So I'm just a "yes" person. If someone says, do you want to come along and do this thing? Do a talk to this school, or to an army base, or wherever it is, I just go, yeah, OK. I'll do it. And I found that I've just been broadening my experiences over this cycle.

[TEXT ON SCREEN: What would your advice be to other elite athletes?]

NEKODA SMYTHE-DAVIS:
My advice would be that when an opportunity comes your way and you have to take a half a Saturday off or maybe it's an evening after training and you know you might be tired, I would say just every so often, just try one of them. It might seem really annoying and pointless at the time, but you can actually start to actually find another niche outside of your sport-- something that you actually are really good at.
I never knew that I could be good at motivating other people or speaking in front - I always thought I was camera shy - I couldn't speak in front of people. But I would say that you'd be surprised about what you can discover about yourself when you try other things.

[TEXT ON SCREEN: Why are you supporting the #More2Me campaign?]

NEKODA SMYTHE-DAVIS:
The reality is that one day, you're not going to be doing this. You're not going to be traveling around the world and winning big medals and feeling the emotions that you're feeling now.
And it's so important that I don't have that feeling of I'm scared to quit. I'm scared to stop. I'm scared to retire because I have nothing else afterwards. And it's really given me that peace of mind that I can just enjoy this journey up until it stops. Because I know that I'm already putting things in place so that when I do finish, I'm not going to be in no-man's land. I know where I'm going from there.

[TEXT ON SCREEN: Nekoda is currently in full time training. She has completed her Level 3 coaching certificate. She regularly gives motivational talks and speeches in her spare time. And has recently become a dog owner! #More2Me. For more information go to: https://www.eis2win.co.uk/service/performance-lifestyle/]

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Discussion

Hannah felt that it was important to develop her life outside sport and spoke about education, media work and socialising as examples of areas she had developed. She felt that these have helped her grow as a person and allow her to switch off from the pressure of sport. She also felt that this would help her to be better prepared for retirement in the future.

Similar to Hannah, Nekoda spoke about the importance of developing her education and broadening her life experiences. She discussed several benefits of this including preparation for life after sport and skill development. She also noted the importance of being able to switch off from sport and stated that she ‘would go stir-crazy’ without other things in her life!

As you saw in previous sessions, there is evidence to support the perspective of these athletes. Research such as Brewer and Petitpas (2017) and Torregrosa et al. (2015) suggest that athletes who develop a ‘multidimensional identity’ cope better with transitions and tend to perform better than athletes who have a ‘unidimensional identity’. In a multidimensional identity, athletes develop different aspects of their identity − such as athlete and student − whereas those with a unidimensional identity concentrate on developing only their athletic identity.

If you are an athlete yourself or involved in supporting athletes, it is important to take note of this. For example, if you are a coach you might find it useful to talk to your athletes about developing their identity beyond sport and encourage them to develop other interests.

The videos you have just watched are part of the English Institute of Sport (EIS) #More2Me campaign [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] launched in 2019 to help athletes develop a better sport–life balance. This campaign is part of their performance lifestyle programme. You will explore performance lifestyle next.