500 days and counting

First of all I’m sorry for not updating my blog sooner, and it is only because of a push from Derbyshire Times that I am writing this one.
To be brutally honest and nakedly truthful I have been too exhausted to attempt to sit and write this blog. I’ve started to work two days a week and continue to train hard, but this is not the cause. Instead, I feel emotionally and psychologically drained and weary. The stress that has come with less than 500 days to the Olympics is almost more than I have found that I can bear.

This stress is mainly manifested by not performing, with the pressure to perform twisting my fencing style into a terrified rabbit-in-the-headlights style: a frustrating cycle. The stress is also magnified by the inescapable Olympic theme running through London and the UK.

The encouragement, passion and interest on the radio, TV, billboards, is absolutely what I would hope for (and what my sponsorship relies on) but I can’t deny it's not stressful to experience constant questioning along the lines of “Do you know if you are in the Olympics yet? Should I bother getting tickets? Should I get a ticket for the early rounds or the finals?”.

After a particularly stressful day of funding meetings and goal setting, I sat down to watch Coronation Street, eat some Chocolate and forget about fencing and the ‘O’ word before I had to go to evening training. Sounds like a solution eh? But aaargh, there, on my Wispa, smirking up at me, were those damn Olympic Rings teasing me and laughing at my thought that I might be able to avoid the Olympics for half an hour of my life.

The stress to perform is becoming ever more public as the excitement for the Olympics heightens. Today I got a text from my friend saying she got a leaflet through her door in Chesterfield with the words ‘meet and greet the amazing Olympic athlete, Hannah Lawrence’ at a Brampton Manor function. (I think the Advertising Agency might have something to say about that). All these moments cause a voice to scream in my head “WHAT'S going to happen if I don’t get in”.


But then I remember that all athletes who have ever made it would have gone through similar thought processes and that I’m pretty sure I am not the first person to have ever stressed out about having pressure to perform as an athlete. And now I feel silly for writing this whole post where I have moaned and felt sorry for myself, and not written about the last competitions

So - in a nut shell: have had ups and downs, with Leipzig A-Grade fencing my best yet and very narrowly losing to a Korean in extra time to make the Last 64, and getting knocked out of the team event by the overall winners, Estonia. Barcelona A-Grade: fencing terribly in individuals and not making it on to the team who then did badly losing to Japan. Finally, to Naples at the European Club Competition fencing for London Thames Fencing Club where, with the pressure dropped, I fenced like a praying mantis(patient and explosive) and loved every minute of it.


For a general update, I am 125th in the World which is currently not enough to qualify but I am moving ever further to the top, second ranked Brit in the World Rankings, and third ranked in National
Rankings. (for more stats
http://www.fie.ch/Competitions/FencerDetail.aspx?param=FEC61CE5E2D2DF9195E37082079DB6E )

CHESTERFIELD

This week I was asked to be an honorary Chesterfield Champion and a promoter of Chesterfield.

Although this is a repeat of my first blog already, this is what I wrote for my profile on their website:


My name is Hannah and I am a fencer, currently living in London, and training full-time in the hope of competing in the 2012 Olympics. This is quite an unusual situation to be in considering that I grew up in Chesterfield, went to Brookfield Community School and loved playing netball and doing athletics at Queens Park Annex. Although my occupation is not typical of a Chesterfieldian, I have no doubt in my mind that it is my upbringing in Chesterfield that got me where I am today.

I started fencing around 14 years old at Wingerworth Fencing Club, who welcome, encourage and nurture everyone who comes through the Sharley Park doors, to embody and love fencing as much as they do. Their love of the sport (and their lifts to various national competitions) inspired me to keep fencing despite GCSE’s, A Levels, Pizza Hut shifts and the bright lights of “chez vegas”.

Brookfield also supported me, finding funding from Derbyshire Sports Council and giving me free use of Brampton Manor for fitness and the Sports Hall for lessons during lunch time.

As I moved to Manchester to Study Sociology at University, despite representing Great Britain on the International Junior Circuit, my funds began to run out - but Chesterfield provided for me once again. My friend’s sister’s friend (in true Chesterfield style) who worked at Steria Ltd (behind the new NHS Centre) offered me sponsorship after I became Senior National Champion, and opened the door to a whole host of new opportunities. I was then able to compete at the Australian Youth Olympics 2009 winning a bronze and gold medal, the Junior Commonwealths 2009, winning a gold medal, and The World Student Games 2010. I was then put on the senior national team and have competed at two World Championships and one European Championship where GBR quarter-finalled in the team event. I am now half way through my second senior international season, am ranked 2nd Nationally and have a world ranking.

With my move down to London in October 2010 and seeing the high standard of Fencing clubs in the South, instead of feeling deprived and disadvantaged growing up away from the centre of fencing, I have realised that without the community spirit of Chesterfield I would never have had the drive to achieve what I have, nor to keep striving to achieve, and I hope to promote my home town further in the run up to our own Olympic Games, London 2012.