Sit back and prepare to be captivated by Derek Redmond, a British sprinting legend whose story of triumph and perseverance is nothing short of extraordinary. Our riveting conversation travels from Derek's early days at school, to the pulse-racing tracks of international stadiums where he shattered records and defied expectations. His journey, marked by both athletic prowess and indomitable spirit, brings to life the essence of what it means to have an Olympian mindset amidst the fiercest of challenges.
In a series of heartfelt and often humorous exchanges, Derek reminisces about the competitive zeal that transformed him from an average club runner to a global icon in the world of athletics. The episode is flecked with moments of levity, as we talk about racing Premier League footballers and the domestic rivalry of taking out the bins—proving that the competitive flame burns bright long after the stadium lights dim. Yet, it's the profound lessons of commitment, parental guidance, and the relentless pursuit of goals that pierce through, offering insights as applicable to the boardroom as they are to the track.
As we wrap up our time with Derek, it's clear that his story transcends the bounds of sports. The themes of dedication, self-belief, and the power of overcoming adversity resonate with an intensity that inspires. Whether you're vying for Olympic gold, navigating the hurdles of business, or facing personal challenges, Derek's experiences, interwoven with tales of other high achievers, serve as a masterclass in harnessing your potential and believing in the impossible. Join us for a conversation that echoes in the chambers of everyday life, lighting a fire within to chase your own version of success.
Check out more of the Focus Cloud Group Podcasts and chats on your favourite media players!
Youtube, Spotify, Apple, Google!
Sit back and prepare to be captivated by Derek Redmond, a British sprinting legend whose story of triumph and perseverance is nothing short of extraordinary. Our riveting conversation travels from Derek's early days at school, to the pulse-racing tracks of international stadiums where he shattered records and defied expectations. His journey, marked by both athletic prowess and indomitable spirit, brings to life the essence of what it means to have an Olympian mindset amidst the fiercest of challenges.
In a series of heartfelt and often humorous exchanges, Derek reminisces about the competitive zeal that transformed him from an average club runner to a global icon in the world of athletics. The episode is flecked with moments of levity, as we talk about racing Premier League footballers and the domestic rivalry of taking out the bins—proving that the competitive flame burns bright long after the stadium lights dim. Yet, it's the profound lessons of commitment, parental guidance, and the relentless pursuit of goals that pierce through, offering insights as applicable to the boardroom as they are to the track.
As we wrap up our time with Derek, it's clear that his story transcends the bounds of sports. The themes of dedication, self-belief, and the power of overcoming adversity resonate with an intensity that inspires. Whether you're vying for Olympic gold, navigating the hurdles of business, or facing personal challenges, Derek's experiences, interwoven with tales of other high achievers, serve as a masterclass in harnessing your potential and believing in the impossible. Join us for a conversation that echoes in the chambers of everyday life, lighting a fire within to chase your own version of success.
Check out more of the Focus Cloud Group Podcasts and chats on your favourite media players!
Youtube, Spotify, Apple, Google!
Welcome back to another episode of Focus Enter the Cloud. Today, lloyd is joined by someone who has represented Great Britain in two Olympic games, competed in numerous world and European championships, most notably a former British record holder in the 400m sprint. So, without further ado, introducing none other than the inspirational Derek Redmond.
Speaker 2:So welcome back everyone to another version of Enter the Cloud. This episode is going to take a slightly different turn, where I've actually invited one of my idols, derek Redmond, to join me, where we're going to be talking about what's important in the mindset and unleashing the Olympian mindset. So thank you so much for joining me. Didn't know that you was one of my older idols, did you?
Speaker 1:I didn't know, I did mate, but it's good to be here and I have gone red, knowing that so but yeah, it's good to see you, mate.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, really good. Thanks for coming in. I don't think we've ever told you actually how I first came across you.
Speaker 3:Wasn't it a video you was watching or not?
Speaker 2:So here we go right. So, as I probably mentioned to you a few times in our conversations, derek's my mindset coach, so you know everyone, so he knows everything about my ups and downs and stuff like that and hopefully ups. So I'm sitting there one morning and what I've been doing for the last eight years, ever since I set up Focus Cloud, is my routine as I get up in the morning, go and feed the animals, make up coffee, come back into my office, put these headphones on right and they're noise-canceling headphones so that's all you can listen to. And then I would put these, these videos that I look at, on on YouTube. And where I came across you was on these videos was I was sitting there doing some work and then I heard this. I heard this like because when you've got them in the background, you're almost not watching the video yeah, so you kind of subconsciously just I call it subconsciously training your brain.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm just working on another screen and and I heard something in the video and I went like that and looked at this other screen where the video was on and I was like wow. And then I went back and the truth is, I must have watched that, that flick, that two-minute clip, about 50 times that morning. Wow, and I was just like why would someone, who's, who's hurt their hamstring in a major event like that? Most, most athletes would just stay down. Right, yeah, they just waddle. Yeah, yeah, most human beings would have stayed down. And I was really pumped and infused by what you did, thank you.
Speaker 2:So then I shared it on LinkedIn yeah and and one of my connections on LinkedIn sent me a message saying that's their equivalent. Because, I'll be honest with you, I didn't know what yeah. I knew I'd seen it in the past, I knew that it was this guy that had injured himself, and then decided to limp to the end yeah and it was very inspirational, but I didn't know who he was at the time in the video right because it was, it was years ago, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it how long? 92 92 1992 wow, yeah, yeah yeah, so.
Speaker 2:And then someone messaged me and said that's Derek Revman and I know him because he's come to do a motivational talk at one of our events. James, james, yeah, yeah. And I was like, james, do me a favor. And he went I'll introduce you now, yeah. And then, before I knew it, two days later we were talking on the phone and we've met a number of times absolutely yeah, that's like.
Speaker 2:So I want to talk about why you did that. Okay, and I think everyone that's watching this podcast is a bit like, a bit like I was at the time. Why would someone do that? Yeah, but I want to go back. Yeah, I want to go back to your early days before we talk about that moment. Okay, that's the.
Speaker 3:That's the moment, really, that made you that's the moment everybody knows absolutely yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, 100.
Speaker 2:So tell me about.
Speaker 3:Tell me about your background background so born in Bletchley, milton Keynes with the roundabouts well, yeah, there wasn't so many roundabouts at the time, so this was before the Milton Keynes that you know existed. So Bletchley, just off the A5 between halfway between London and Birmingham basically I was born there. Mum and dad were both from Trinidad and Tobago, came over here as part of the Windrush generation. They weren't on the Windrush, but they were part of that generation of people that came over from the Caribbean to seek a better life. Dad was a lorry driver. Mum was doing adult education at the time teaching adult education at the time. Yeah, there was me and my sister. I'm one of two, my sister's two years older than me born into a council house, hardworking parents, typical strict west indian parents.
Speaker 2:I'll know that you know that, absolutely. Yeah, that was Jamaican.
Speaker 3:Well, there you go yeah, so you know you couldn't parent now the way they parented had been previously, but I don't, I don't, I have holding up my genes at the moment.
Speaker 2:The facility, or the tool, absolutely would you keep me in line. Absolutely, yeah, I've got one of those as well, so yeah, people are thinking, what are they talking about?
Speaker 3:but anyway, if you know, you know, it's the belt yeah.
Speaker 3:So that was great. Nothing particularly extraordinary about my you know upbringing to those strict parents. So you know, we moved from one out of this council house into a little semi detached house and then we moved from Milton Keynes to Northampton. As I got older by the time I was, I don't know, you know, 11, 12 I was into my sport, into athletics. I was a member of a local club, so my first club was Milton Keynes athletics club and then when we moved to Northampton, joined the club in Northampton, got into secondary school, got exposed to a lot more sports and I love sport quick yes, was you, naturally quick, not just naturally quick and naturally sports minded.
Speaker 3:I loved sport and even back then and it's quite funny to you talk, you know you kind of introduced me about the Barcelona clip, unknowns to me my mental training pretty much started from a very young age. I didn't know this and that was because of my dad. Why age? When I first joined my first athletic club seven, so I would say from the age of seven my dad, again kind of unknowingly, was just using his common sense and his way that he thought you should approach these things. And as a seven-year-old kid being told by your dad who you got a great relationship, who you love and respect, I just listened and I'll give you some examples of it.
Speaker 3:So anyway, going to secondary school, it's obvious that I'm quick and I'm into athletics and I'm playing football, I play rugby. I think out of all the sports that we did, the only two teams I was named was the swimming team and the tennis team. You know gymnastics, I was in that football, cricket, rugby, low basketball, hockey, all sorts of stuff. But what made me really focus more on my sport was, unfortunately I was me and my sister were the only two back kids in the school, so we had a lot of crap this is um, this is early 80s early 80s, early, early, early 80s, yeah, I would say late 70s, early 80s.
Speaker 3:Loads crap at school, won't go into that, but as you can imagine, so for me my backyard was on the sports field, so when they gave me crap in the playground I would take it out on them on the sports field, whatever it was, and I made it my mission to make them look stupid in any way I can on the sports field because I could do that without having to argue or whatever. And for me that was it. I only grew a little bit of um. Popularity was when I was being called up in assembly for being represented for the county or this and that and awards and goodness knows what.
Speaker 3:Um, and that was my metaphorical kind of middle finger up to all the crap that I had. Um, and I hated school. Uh, secondary school had a lot of trouble, had a lot of scuffles, more than fights, because they last a few seconds and some are one, some are lost, and you know, and as I got older, um, and when I was at school it was first year, second year, third, fourth, fifth year, none of this year 11, year 12, which I still don't get and I've had four kids go through that process.
Speaker 3:Um, uh, by the time I got to about the fourth year, everyone thought I was one of the toughest kids in the school and I wasn't. I just stood up for myself. Yeah, I just stood up for myself, whether it meant getting a bit of a pasting or I got the better of somebody, and I think that's what kind of set me up a little bit of of of how to deal with things was was really to tackle them head on because I had no choice. I'd know pardon the expression I'd know where to run. Um, because it was a lot of people at school that gave me a lot of crap. Uh, and that's not a get your violins out thing, that was just as it was. You know.
Speaker 2:You know what? You know what? Um, I had the same thing, yeah and uh. By by the time I was um, by the time I was 11 years old, I could run 100 meters. And I'd run 100 meters in just over 11, 12, 13. I'd be running in 100 meters in just over 11 seconds right, you know where I learned to run fast from people running, running from the kids. Yeah, around my area. Yeah, and it's not a filing thing because it's it's it's life right? Yeah, well, I did the opposite.
Speaker 3:I didn't run.
Speaker 3:Really, I just didn't run and I just I did in the beginning but I'd run from A to B and get away from them. So when I first went to my secondary school first day, brand new blazer, way too big, you know, as you did, you know looking green as as he can, and, funny enough, our blazers were green and all the new uniform, all this sort of stuff, and there was a kid, a man as far as I was concerned. So I'm in the first year, he's in the fifth year, all right, and he's come up to me and he's with his mates and he's given it this, that you know all the names and blah, blah, and he had a broken leg. He had a cast right up to his, up to his thigh, and the story was during the summer holidays, I was messing around on trial spikes and he fell off, broke his leg, and this he was a man as far as I was concerned, you know, because I'm 11 and he's like 15, you know 16 years of age, so, and so he gives me some lyrics.
Speaker 3:So, me being me a cheeky little scam, I kicked him in his good leg and ran because I figured well he can't run after me and I know I could get away from them.
Speaker 3:I'm gonna wear him to school anyway. Within minutes his mates caught up with me, beat the stuffing out of me, ripped the blade arm off my blazers, this and that, and I just went, okay, so this is how it's gonna be. So I didn't stop. If somebody was cheeky to me I'd give it back. My sister was the same. She was two years older and she had a good reputation in the school as well of not someone to mess with. I remember the story of once when she was in a. I wasn't even at the school, she was in a maths class and the guy behind her was giving the crap, so she stood up in anger. He stood up so she'd need him straight in the nuts, so I ended up passing out. So people realised she wasn't going to take crap and so she was my protection almost, and we kind of looked after each other and I got to a point there's a saying the first year where I did run and I thought you know what I'm not doing five years of this, so you're six.
Speaker 3:I'm I'm 11 when I went to secondary school.
Speaker 2:Okay, so this was. Yeah, this is 11th second school.
Speaker 3:I'm not running, so by the time I was like 6 or 12, 12, I just I'm not running, yeah, and I just dealt with it face to face, whether they were my year older, two years older, whatever, and, as I say, some times, a lot of times, it got stopped, got broken up, it was just words.
Speaker 3:Sometimes it'd be a bit of pushing and shoving, sometimes there'll be a bit of a punch and a kick from someone and I'd get a few in and and I got to the point where I would just fight back. And I remember when you know, every time it happens it was the same thing I get called to the teacher's office or whatever, and they say, oh, just turn the other cheek. And I say, why am I going to turn the other cheek? Because all they're going to do is spit on that side as well. You know the void on that side. I turn, they go no, you know, and I and I my thing was I'm never going to start anything, but I'm going to be the one to try and finish it and not trying to make out I'm brave or anything like that, but it was just an attitude that I took because I had had enough already.
Speaker 3:After a year and a bit and, as I say, by the fourth year there was still. I grow not as much, but I'm now one of the older. I mean the second half of my sporting things are going rugby, basketball and athletics going well for me, so there's a bit of respect from there. There's a few people now who are my allies, who I'm playing sports with, and there's one particular guy and I will name him Pete Wilson, real good guy. We played a lot of basketball together and he was six foot plus when we were at school and he kind of protected me quite a lot and had my back. But there was literally a handful of people that that had my back when I was at school all the way through my school career and yeah, so
Speaker 3:that kind of how I was sports wise, things were going well and I was running for my county and I was running for school and I was at an athletics club as well. And by the last part of my last couple of years in my school life I was kind of juggling with basketball and football sorry, basketball and athletics. So you are what, 15, 15, and I'm still playing a lot of basketball, 15, 16. I'm playing a lot of basketball and a lot of athletics. And when I was 15 so I was a hundred and 200 meter runner at the time. And when I was 15 I was running for my club, northampton phoenix, and I ran the hundred, finished third, run the 200, finished third. And it's a club competition. So it's all age groups, male and female, all events, track and field, and once all the events have been done, you get eight points for a win. One point for eight. Whoever's got the most points wins that round and you go on to the next round and whoever gets the most points wins the league.
Speaker 3:So the guy who was supposed to run the 400 didn't show up for a reason I don't know. So the team manager was desperate for someone to run the 400 and he said look, would you run it? Even if you just jog around, we'll get a point, and that could make the difference at the end of the day. So Jack and my dad jokingly said well, have you got to lose besides another race? It's all you're gonna lose, so give it a go. I had no idea I'd run the race. So we came up with this weird idea of what to do, which I did. Gun went and I sprinted off slow down. Sprinted off slow down, didn't know what the hell I was doing, won it by a country mile and broke the county record for my age, first time ever run a 400.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:And I wasn't even thinking about the time.
Speaker 2:For me, 15 years of age, I've won a race I finished first, because in the 100 and 200, you wasn't winning.
Speaker 3:I wasn't winning. No, there's a guy I trained with who was English schools champion, dale Hillary. He was quicker than me all the time so he would always beat me. One of my other training partners who was about a year old and a guy called Tony Blanche. He was quicker than me so I always finished third to those guys. They were the two, but I was still chasing and chasing and chasing and I loved it.
Speaker 3:Anyway, run this 400, won it. So for the rest of the season I ran sort of the ones, the twos and the fours. Didn't win a one or a two, I don't remember or don't recall winning, but I won all the 400s. And at the end of that year I said you know what I'm gonna run 400s because the training for the ones and twos completely different to the training for four. So I had to commit to the training which I did. By the time I was 16, I finished second in English school. So I've gone from half decent club athlete to the second fastest athlete in the country for my age group to getting my first junior international for England and then a year later, when I'm 17, my first full international for Great Britain. Fast forward, two years later I'm ranked in the top five in the world. Now the British record.
Speaker 2:So you're aged, then 19. So you're 19,. So you go from being probably someone that sounds like I could have beat in 100 and 200.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, maybe not, maybe not. But yeah, we're going to go with it. We're gonna test it out a moment, right.
Speaker 2:We're gonna test it out a moment. I would like to do that actually at one point. I would actually like to do that. Yes, I am challenging a ex Olympic runner to 100 meters dash.
Speaker 3:Oh God.
Speaker 2:Anywhere he likes, at any time where he likes, and we'll do it for charity.
Speaker 3:Well, do you know what? I'm up for that? I'm up for that, mate. I'm 100% up for that. I'm not even worried about losing, I'm just worried about pulling a hamstring, that's all I'm gonna say Don't do the hamstring thing.
Speaker 2:I don't want to do the hamstring. I've only had Joel Kirkland do the hamstring thing when I decimated him To be honest with you.
Speaker 3:I wouldn't pull a hamstring because I wouldn't need to do that quick to be honest with you.
Speaker 1:So just enough to stay in front, oh, oh.
Speaker 2:It's a challenge. I like a challenge.
Speaker 3:Do you know the funny thing like that? So I get so many people, my wife being one. So my wife, we've obviously met and got married and we've given us all that after my athletics career. So she unfortunately wasn't part of my career when I was running, so she only knows what I used to do, wasn't around seeing me train in this and that she's always like because she just sees the prep that puts the bins out on a Thursday night. You know trains, the cars. She doesn't know the athlete. That side of things she does, but she doesn't. You know what I mean. So she'll say things like I reckon I can beat you now because look at you, you're just a regular guy, isn't that?
Speaker 2:And I say don't go there. I've got to be honest ever since. We just shook our hands. Yeah, this is lying and I'm just looking at you as you know you know me as me. It's just how I'm wired right and obviously you had to be wired like that to go into the Olympics to a certain extent, right.
Speaker 3:But if you were to, I don't know, I am going to beat you, Derek.
Speaker 2:You're not going to beat me. Man, I'm going to beat you. You're not going to beat me.
Speaker 3:You're not, mate, I'm going to beat you. You're not, we're going to have 58 minutes. If you're going to beat me now, you know he's not going to win. Okay, that's it Done. Next question because he's not going to win, how are you going to win? It's a bit like I don't know, you befriending David Beckham. What happens?
Speaker 2:if you Hold on a minute.
Speaker 3:Just didn't we finish this. It's a bit like you befriending David Beckham, Arguably one of the best footballers this country the world has ever seen, and you're saying do you know what? Yeah, I already know, Ben. You know I could nutmeg you, I could do this. What I consider to be slow is still quicker. The 90% of the world's population could run.
Speaker 2:What can you do to 100 meters in a row? I?
Speaker 3:don't know the last time I ran 100, and I'm going back a few years ago, around 10.8 or something like that 10.8.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're yeah. Yeah, don't worry about what I just said. I mean, it's absolutely fine. I was just joking.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, we're having this race. We're having this race now. I remember a number of years ago I was doing some personal training. Sorry, I was doing some coaching, for I'm not going to say which team it was, but for a premiership team, yes, all right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and their manager at the time we're at a golf day and he asked me would I come and do some stuff with the lads? As he said so. And when I did some stuff, same thing came out. Oh yeah, ratio, ratio, ratio. So we did this training session and I'm crap at football, so they've got me doing these football drills, which I'm all over the place. And then at the end he said right, we're going to have a run the length of the pitch. I ran barefoot and by the we started on the touch line, you know the back line, and by the time we got to level with the penalty box the other end, I turned around and jogged over the line backwards and watched the rest of them sprinting across the line Premier League footballers Premier.
Speaker 3:League footballers. With any fast players, couple of decent players.
Speaker 2:Fast players.
Speaker 3:Yes, a couple of it's a Premier League football. Yeah, they had a couple of fast players, so I won't mention them, but if anybody knows. You know which team I'm talking about. Again, it was a few years ago, but I'd been long retired and yeah. So mate, yeah, well, that was a good one it's too late, you said it.
Speaker 2:You did too, I'll do it. We'll do it for charity. Oh, mate, it'll be a laugh of course it will.
Speaker 3:We'll do it for charity.
Speaker 2:If I were you, I'd finish up and go and get trained. But what happens if I win?
Speaker 3:What do you want to happen If you win? It's for charity. Well, how do you want to do this? Do you want to put a bet down and the money goes to charity?
Speaker 2:I don't know how you want to do it Okay, but you've got to give me really good odds.
Speaker 3:Oh, here we go odds Look it's win, lose.
Speaker 2:Hold on a minute. You're an ex-Olympian.
Speaker 3:You're the one challenging me.
Speaker 2:I know so then, but I've already said yeah, I'm an ex-Olympian. My mouth gets me into trouble a few times. Yeah, but I'm an ex-Olympian.
Speaker 3:My last game was in 1992. I will be 60 next year 60? I'll be 60 next year. I'm pretty sure I'll get that. I'm getting Vegas, mate, you want to come with me? I think I can be 60.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's fine. You tell me You've got to give me good odds, you've got to give me ex-Olympian odds.
Speaker 3:Which is what?
Speaker 2:Let's say, let's say, let's say, one in four odds, right. So I'll put money in, we'll do an entry.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And then we'll have to do a fourth fit, and then the fourth fit will be ex-Mountain Pounds. But if you lose you've got to pay times four.
Speaker 3:Oh blimey, how old are you? 46. 46. So you're 46. So you're like 14 years younger than me. So that's got to be. Maybe take one of those points off. So that's point three. We're really not going through this, we're just talking about this bet.
Speaker 2:now Look let's come back to that. Okay, we'll come back to that, but it's on, we will do it. We will do it Absolutely. We're going to do it for charity, right? Yeah, we'll do it.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I was saying yes, that's how I kind of got into very whirlwind. I kind of, you know, the athletics thing sort of I wouldn't say happened by accident, but it just developed and became. You know, it got to the point that so by the time I was 19, I went to Oslo, bislet Games, 27th of July 1985. I'd ranked about seventh in Great Britain, won that race and came out ranked fifth in the world, broke the British record and that's pretty much where my whole athletics career.
Speaker 2:So you almost fell into this 400, right, Because it wasn't a plan no the 400 wasn't a plan.
Speaker 3:It was definitely something that, you're right, I fell into and, as I always refer to, I ran my first 400 by accident. But then there's stories to be learned from that. You know where. You know the opportunity was there, and more because of my dad. It was me and my dad, but it was my dad to just and I never forget the phrase what have you got to lose besides another race?
Speaker 3:And for me, one of the things that stops people doing things that they want to do is they're more worried about what other people will say about them. They're afraid of failings, and I asked them what is it about failing you don't like Because it's not painful. You're going to learn from it one way or another and what it boils down to. They're more worried about what other people say. If they don't achieve whatever it is, they say Most sportsmen and women don't think like that.
Speaker 3:They will try new things, new diets, new training programs, new techniques, new methodology, new equipment, and if it fails they'll go okay, well, that doesn't work, let's try something. They take it as a learning, and that's kind of what I do. So there's stuff to be learned from you know, even from what I did in that extent. But all the way through that point my old man wasn't a coach. He didn't know athletics inside out, he wasn't a technical buff when it comes to athletics, very successful businessman, and all my dad did was take that business mindset attitude and bring that into athletics. So a very quick story A few years prior to you know, when I was 19, I was still running for Northampton Phoenix, still running ones and twos. We've got a competition in Peterborough, which is about an hour from Northampton, and we get on the coach and all the kids are there.
Speaker 3:Parents, mum and dad are there.
Speaker 1:So a bunch of us go yeah, yeah, when we get there we're going to play football.
Speaker 3:Right, you're in goal. You're doing this, you're doing that. Yeah, I'll play back. I want to play striking my dad just sat there.
Speaker 3:We get there coach stopped as soon as it pulls into the car park. I give my dad my bag and we all get off the coach and we're all trying to find the nearest field. Dad comes off the coach Derek, come here now. I'm going back to that West Indian pair. I went just stop. What do you think you're doing? I said what do you mean? You're here, we're playing football. You ain't coming to play football, get in now. And my dad made me sit down and rest and this and that and blah, blah, blah. And I'm looking over there. They're all playing football. I can see kids with their shirts over there going, yeah, after they scored all the other stuff. And I'm sitting here watching the track and that's the right time to go warm up. They say I have some fruit. Anyway, meeting goes on. We're on the coach on the way back, everyone's absolutely knackered and all kids sit and I'm sitting there and got a bag full of trophies, medals and well medals and certificates and my dad's gone. What's?
Speaker 1:that one for.
Speaker 3:I'm thinking he knows that. So I asked for the hundred. Oh, why that one? That's for the 200. That's for the long jump. What's this one? He went, how did young Lloyd get on over there? He said finished fifth. What about young David over there? Not sure we do. What about Pete down there? I didn't even run because he twisted his ankle playing football. I went oh no, so what does?
Speaker 3:that tell you. And I went what do you mean? He says I know, when I stopped you playing football, you thought I was the worst dad in the world and you this, and that I was not fair. Blah, blah, blah. But he said if you want to go and play football, we're going to run a football club. But you weren't here to play football, you were here to compete. Now, if you look at everything that everyone else has done, he was playing football. You look at what you've done, what's the biggest difference? And the penny drops. And my dad gave me lessons like that in life all the time and from a young age I took my affidets quite seriously and I took that professional approach to it. What age was it? Oh, it's just from then, which I would have been about 13 or 14 years old.
Speaker 2:So 13 or 14, you're still coming. What second?
Speaker 3:second, third, winning the odd one here and there but taking it very seriously.
Speaker 3:in order to come first, Because my dad was always saying to me I don't care what sport you do, I will always take you and support you as much as I can, but there's three people's time. I don't want you to waste his time, the coach's time and my own time. So I don't care how good or bad you are, just as long as you are giving it 100%. That's all I ask for. And if you want to stop, we'll stop. And if you want to go and start playing cricket, tennis, rugby, football, swimming your mum and I will support you as and where we can. But I just ask that you give it 100%, as long as you're not wasting that time. That's all I ask for. And I actually thought as a real, as a kid, it kind of went over your head. But as you get a bit older and these things you know starts and there's so many stories I could give you you know about my dad and the things that he would just do, the things that he would just say to me.
Speaker 3:You know, I remember when I ran a 400, I got into 400, and I finished second in English school and the guy that beat me was a guy called Kurt Morby from Lincolnshire, and he won the English schools and I came second and a bit of a let's just say a very confident young man, and his dad was just as confident. So he used to rub me up the wrong way a little bit. If you're watching this, kurt, it's good to see you again, but you did rub me up the wrong way and I remember turning up at a meeting just to get some times in. It's called an open meeting. You turn up, pay your fiver, tell them your age, tell them your time, you go away. After about 20 minutes they come back and they tell you what heat you're in. So they get the top eight fastest in one.
Speaker 3:Anyway we've come back, and a few minutes later we've come back and I'm in heat one because I'm one of the. Well, I thought it would be the fastest because the only person who could beat me was Kurt he's in the damn race and my heart sank I thought, oh no, Kurt's in it. So I'm quite nervous because I'm racing Kurt Morby in the school champion. He's beaten him.
Speaker 3:I'm thinking in this little this is just in a little meeting. It's not even a heat, it's just a little one off race. They call them open meetings. So you just turn up, pay your fiver and you run. You're running for times. It's not a heat or a knockout competition, it's just a little meeting put on by clubs.
Speaker 3:And I'm really nervous. I'm really oh God. And my coach said right, we're going to try something different, because every time I race Kurt, I'd never beaten him and he'd always win pretty comfortably, a lot stronger than me. So my coach says to me we're going to try something different today. I said well, I'll say I want you to go out in the first two ones a lot quicker than you normally do, and by the time we've got 100 meters to go, I want you to be level or in front of Kurt, put him under pressure, because he's never had that. By the time of 100 meters to go, the race is won. I'm like oh God. So anyway, go and warm up. I'm really nervous. And my dad says to me Derek, why are you so nervous? I said what do you mean, dad? I've got to race Kurt. Now I've got to do something.
Speaker 3:I don't even know what I'm doing and my dad said to me Derek, don't worry, you're not going to lose this race. I went, do you mean I'm not going to lose this race? He goes, you're not going to lose this race. One of two things are going to happen You're either going to finish first or, if you don't finish first, you'll learn something. The only way you lose this race is if you don't finish first and you don't learn anything, then you've lost the race. Anyway, I go out suicidal for the first 200. I'm miles in front. Kurt comes back because he's a stronger finisher than me, and we end up dipping for the line and he got it. They gave him the win. So I was really disappointed because I thought I'd nearly beat him. And after the race I'm a bit dejected. He had down his head and my dad came out and said what did you learn? No, kurt, more is better than me. I can't beat him. No, no, no, no, no, no. What did you learn? Seriously, you know, pick his head up and stop being silly.
Speaker 2:Away from him, right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, not far away from him, my dad and my coach had a conversation and basically the learning was you can afford to go out a lot quicker in the first 200. Maybe not as quick as you did, but we can work on that. So I went into training, back into training, and we worked on my first 200 meter pace to be quicker than what it used to be, but not as suicidal as it was in that race. The next time I race Kurt with this new way of running 400, I beat him and he never beat me again. So the point of that is, as my dad said and this comes back to what I was saying about when people hate to, you know sometimes don't like try things because they're afraid of failing quote unquote.
Speaker 1:In that race.
Speaker 3:It looked like from the outset I failed. I hadn't failed. I was trying something that didn't work the way that we did it, but we were heading in the right direction. The formula needed tweaking, the processes needed a little bit of looking at, and we messed around with it, tweaked around with it, got it right, and that's what kind of set me off. So my dad was full of it and I could sit here for the next three hours talking about lots of little things at the time that my dad would just say to me because it was just his natural way of thinking.
Speaker 2:Here's the question yeah, that no one's probably ever asked you before.
Speaker 3:Go on.
Speaker 2:Would you have been an Olympian without your dad?
Speaker 3:No, no. I don't even know if I would have been in the sport without my dad. Great question no one's ever asked me that. I don't even think I would have been in the sport if it wasn't for it. Or if I was, I wouldn't have been as focused, I wouldn't have been as prepared to give everything. I wouldn't have been as focused, I wouldn't have been as committed if it wasn't for my dad. 100%.
Speaker 2:Sounds like it kind of set you up to have the freedom to try anything you wanted and not. You wouldn't lose any of his love if you didn't win.
Speaker 3:No, or if I chose not to do it. And, as I say, if I said to my dad I'm really not enjoying this, he would just say, okay, why not? And I said, okay, fine, what do you want to do? And that's how my dad was. He never put me under pressure. He did push me, but in the right way.
Speaker 3:So we moved into a village location years later and it was a small village we lived in. It was a third of a mile once around. So I used to do in the winter, I used to do three mile runs. So I'd have to do like 11 laps of this bloody village, whatever it was, just over 11 or whatever it was and we used to time the laps and my dad, when I first used to do it, I used to plod round and every now and then my dad would, I don't know, sit at the front of the house up in his bedroom and he would time the odd lap and then come back and I didn't know and he'd say do you know, lap four was this time, lap seven was this time and lap nine was this time.
Speaker 3:We need to try and see if we can pick the pace up a little bit. And he goes just for yourself, because I'm not a coach, but let's just see if you can push it. And he got to the point where either he or my sister would time the laps around the village. Now he didn't have to do that, but again he wasn't saying go on, derek, run harder, run harder. He would just say let's see if we can just edge it a little bit. Set this as a goal. So now you know you can do six laps in this time. Let's see if you can do seven laps in that time, before they start to slow down. Let's see if you can do eight laps. When you can do all 11 laps in that time, let's try and do 10 in that time and make the first one a little bit quicker. And then the second one, you know, comparable to the first. And then we push it up and he says as the years and time go, you'll always get slightly quicker and quicker and quicker. So we made this.
Speaker 2:It's like a game. It's playing a game.
Speaker 3:Yeah, just enough to push.
Speaker 2:And if I didn't, it's all right.
Speaker 3:And how did you feel? And I said, oh God, I'm back at that, this and that it might be windy, it might be raining. And he said well, it's hammering down with rain, it's windy. You weren't never going to do that, but don't let that defeat you next time.
Speaker 2:I never had the pleasure to meet your father I wish you had.
Speaker 3:That was great man I wish I had.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, brilliant, brilliant man, If I'd have ever sat down with your dad and slid on a one to one and said did you know that he was going to be an Olympian? What do you think he would have?
Speaker 3:said he would have said I think he would have said I had the ability. He would definitely would have said my sister had more talent than me. We just hated the sport. So Karen did have more talent than me, but just hated it. But he would also agree that I had, through what he had done, I had that competitive edge that was always going to make me compete well. So, yes, I think he would have said yes, with a combination of the ability that I had and the attitude that I developed and the competitiveness that I developed, he would have said yes 100%.
Speaker 2:It's interesting. So you almost kind of architected your career along the way without knowing, without knowing, without knowing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Do you know there's a film I wonder if he did. Do you know the film? King Richard?
Speaker 3:Yes, I watched that I watched that only a year ago and I sat there like this at the TV screen and Maria sat looking at me like that and she said that's your man. And I went, yeah, and there was so much of my dad in that film. It was untrue. Not to the full extreme. I'm never going to say my dad was exactly like that, but my dad knew and saw things way ahead of time, before I was even thinking about it, and he had that kind of sixth sense to say this is what you're destined to do, this is what's going to be happening in your future, as long as you stay within these lines, so to speak.
Speaker 2:You know when I first watched King Richard, and anyone who's not seen the film.
Speaker 1:Richard, go and watch it. Yes, great film.
Speaker 2:You know what it said to me. It wasn't so much about how Richard I forget what's his surname- Williams. Williams, richard Williams. So how Richard Williams pushed Venus and Serena. It said to me that natural talent never existed. Never existed in the first place because you can't have two daughters and say before they're born, these are going to be world champion tennis players, and then it happens. That's not possible.
Speaker 3:Well, so I take it one stage further. The bit in the film that absolutely blew my mind was because in the early days Venus was the big star and Serena was sort of slightly in her shadow. And then the man. It got to the point where Venus was doing her thing and something happened at a tournament and Serena walks I don't want to spoil the film for anybody who hasn't seen it, but she kind of walks onto the court where her sister was playing earlier on and she's a bit dejected because she feels that all the attention is on from her dad and everybody in the world is on Venus. And he walked down and said don't worry, you are the one who's destined to be the absolute superstar. I can't remember it word for word, but he basically said buy your time because actually you are the one.
Speaker 2:Venus is going to be great. You're going to be a world beater or something like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, something like that and it was like wow, he knew that her time wasn't going to be yet like any young person. You wanted all now and yeah, so for me. That was the bit in the film that just blew my mind Brilliant film. If you haven't seen it, sorry for the spoiler, but it's definitely worth going to say I'm more than happy to spoil it for everyone.
Speaker 2:So what happens after you've done it? Ok, so that's a great question. I wasn't planning on asking you that question, that's all right, but as we've been talking, I wonder if his dad actually knew that this is what I'm doing this is where it's going to lead, as long as he does this, this and this.
Speaker 3:I think, yes, he did, and I think he was also just paving the way for the best opportunity for me and giving me the best chance that he could give me, and whether that was with financial support, whether that was with just giving me the support that I needed, whether it be physio, a bit of advice, whatever, not that he was a physio, but making sure I get to the physio, making sure I've got the right. He advised me on when I had to change clubs because I was getting better, so I needed clubs at Better League. We talked about it and where I was the best ways to go and this and that. So it was always there to give me the best opportunity that I could have. And it was almost like it was for me to screw up because he was doing everything that he could physically and mentally.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good, so let's fast forward. So you're this great 400 meters runner and then, all of a sudden, you get the opportunity to go to the Olympics. How did that happen?
Speaker 3:So my first Olympics was 88. So and it happened very simply I qualified for the team. I was one of the top 400 meter runners in the world at the time. I'd had a few injury problems, so things were.
Speaker 2:What's that like when you're the best in the UK? You're a good local, national athlete and then, all of a sudden, what happens to your? Is it easy to get away with yourself?
Speaker 3:OK, yes, it can be easy to get away with yourself, but what actually happens is nothing, because you are doing what you do best. So I want to mean by that is, I was just. I was doing the same thing wherever I was running for my club, wherever I was running Olympic Games, just trying to win a 400 meter race.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but, derek things change, right Things are, but that's right.
Speaker 3:On the outside they change, but from my point of view it's exactly the same. So I worked a few years ago with a motocross rider and he was an international motocross rider when he competed for his club. Technically he was brilliant. His start once the gate's dropped he was out into the first corner and all this sort of stuff. At international competition he wouldn't perform that start as well. So if you took his start from a club level, it was quicker than the same guy starting at international competition. And his dad and his couple of years ago couldn't understand it why. So they brought me into having this. And anyway I said to him talk me through your warm-up at club level. So he told me what he did and I said now talk me, do you do exactly the same at international? Oh, no, no, no, no. I said well, talk me what you do at international level. And he did. And his warm-up and his mental process was totally different. Why was that? That's exactly why I asked him. So I said why is that? And he performed a few weeks ago at the same circuit.
Speaker 3:Club level was brilliant. Yes, he was going to win because talent-wise he was better, but from a technical point of view, he rode worse at international level than he did at club level. So I said to him you want to have certain differences. Why don't you warm up international at the same? Because you're doing exactly the same thing for the same laps on the same bike. It's just no difference. The prize might be different, the people who are watching you might be different, but your bike is the same bike, your equipment is the same bike, you are the same person, the track is the same track. Yes, obviously there's different ruts, and it's not, but generally.
Speaker 3:So, whether I was running for my club, just for points, or whether I was running for an Olympic gold medal, which was medals, fame and fortune, my preparation was exactly the same, because when I'm in that lane it's still 400 meters run round. The prize might be different, but actually the process I'm going through is exactly the same. So I was able to zone out what it meant. It's just another 400, and it's a phrase my dad used to say. There was two things my dad used to say to me it's just another 400, and it's just a matter of time. It's just a matter of time before you win this race. It's also a matter of the time that you run. So it was kind of a bit of a double-edged sword and that was again going back to just another 400.
Speaker 3:Go and do what you've been doing since you were 15 years of age. Rather than being on a Cinder track in Northampton, it's now on a Mondo surface track that happens to be in the Olympic stadium. But you can kind of take away some of that pressure, because that's all external and that's why I was so as I was going through the ranks. It was just what I did. You kind of take it for granted and you just crack on and do what you do. You trade the times, get quicker. You race the times, get quicker, but you're just doing what I was doing.
Speaker 2:The process was no different. You're 19,. You're a national runner. You said we was at national level there, right?
Speaker 3:Oh, international, that's nice.
Speaker 2:International level. And then you burst onto the Olympic scene.
Speaker 3:Let's say after the first. That was three years later, so I was 22 at my first Olympics.
Speaker 2:Okay, and then you're burst into this kind of international stardom where you come back to the UK and everyone knows who you are.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but my first Olympics was bad. So I went into those Olympics injured I had Achilles, tendon problems, the whole training camp and goodness knows well and I actually snapped my Achilles warming up for the first round. So I didn't actually compete in the Olympics in 88. So my Olympic experience wasn't great. So my focus wasn't oh my God, this is the Olympic Games. My focus was crap. We need to sort these Achilles out. Am I gonna be able to run? And if I am, am I gonna be quick enough? Because I was good enough to make the final and challenge for a medal and Great Britain was good enough to at least win a bronze medal in the relay. Maybe a silver, definitely a silver. Was that push against Americans for the gold? So I've got a chance of coming away from my first Olympic Games with at least two finals and, if all went well, two medals. There was a possibility, didn't happen at all, so my focus was elsewhere. It wasn't on.
Speaker 3:And the thing about competing over Olympic Games or were any major championships? I think there's always two types of athletes. Let's take an Olympic Games. There'll be people who'll go to Paris this year who, as far as there's concern, have won their Olympic gold. In other words, they're an Olympian. They've made the Olympic Games and that has been their dream. There's nothing wrong with that at all. But there's also a much smaller group of Olympians whose Olympic gold happens to be an Olympic gold and they are capable of winning Olympic gold. There are people that can live for the rest of life and say, as I can, I'm an Olympian. I will be an Olympian to the day I die.
Speaker 3:I'm not happy with my Olympic career because I believe I was good enough to win a medal. If you take Usain Bolt, do you think he would be happy to say I'm an Olympian? No, of course he wouldn't, because that guy was more than capable of being an Olympic champion. So there's kind of you need to work out what's your gold. Your gold might be just making the final. Anything beyond that is a bonus, because you also have to be realistic with these things. Your gold might be I wanna make the Olympic teams in weightlifting, in judo, in this it doesn't matter what sport and you do it and anything you go and do.
Speaker 3:For me, fortunately or unfortunately, my aim was to win medals at major championships because I believed and, based on performances and times, I had the ability. If everything went to plan and got it all right, I was in the hunt for medals. So competing at Olympic games or whatever, for me was just taking care of business. It was business. I didn't not enjoy the Olympics when I didn't go outside, see, and I didn't go do this. I just went to those games to do one thing, and it wasn't to get off the coach and run off into the field and play football. It was to do exactly what my dad made me do when I was 13 years of age and focus on things make sure the diet's right. I'm training every day, I'm resting, I'm doing all the things, all my kits right, I've got the right spikes, I've tested this out, I've got them walk around the track, see which way the wind goes, all the stuff that not every athlete does. But I did because that was all part of my preparation, my routine, my routine. And there are Olympians that go and I've got nothing on one of it who may not it may have been a relay for argument's sake, so they might get a chance, were they not gonna run but they enjoy it, they embrace that I'm at the Olympic games.
Speaker 3:They go to the opening ceremony. I didn't go to the opening ceremony. I don't wanna stand around for four hours. Now that's not me being a prima donna, but standing around for four, five hours few days before you're gonna run is not really the best thing to be doing. So no, if I could get out of going to the opening ceremony, I would. I didn't for Seoul. We flew out to Japan State and our training camp was there. Some people went from Japan to Seoul to be involved in the opening ceremony and get the. I didn't. I waited a couple of days before round one before I flew out because I wasn't there for the bright lights and all the thing.
Speaker 3:I was there for work and people might say, oh, that's a sad thing and my wife says oh, you didn't go and see that. No, I was there for work, I wasn't there to sightsee and this and that. So our one of our light dream and we're slowly working our way through it is to go to all the countries that I went to whether it was from Olympics or just a one off race, and actually experience those countries, rather than going from the airport to a hotel to a track, back to the hotel, back to an airport, because I haven't seen those countries. They just stamped in a passport and I'll tell you the results, but I can't tell you anything about that country and that's how they. And so for me, my affidavits.
Speaker 3:Korea was like that, so I didn't necessarily feel the pressure of, oh my God, this is Olympics. Yes, I knew it was Olympics, I knew the athletes are there, but if I did what I knew I could do and everything had gone well up there, I knew I was gonna be in a chance to make myself proud. Whether that was making a final, whether that was a win in the medal, whether that was winning gold, I knew I could do what. So it was about me taking care of business leading up to those championships and, more important, delivering it when it mattered, stepping up to that plate when it mattered. But if you've done all the work leading up to it, then there's no reason why it's not gonna happen. You know, when it comes to any race, any competition and we're talking Olympic games you know, an hour before that Olympic final, there's nothing I can do physically about it. I've done all the training. I can't say you know what, I'm gonna pop into gym and pump some iron just to get some extra strength. You're not gonna do anything. There's nothing physically you can do to me. It's all mental.
Speaker 3:So I spent a lot of time studying athletes, sometimes just by staring at them. When I see them around, thinking, I wonder what you or she's thinking. They've just won a medal or something. You see them in the canteen or whatever. What would they have gone through the last day? What were they thinking an hour before, two hours before, three hours before? What was said to them, what wasn't said to them?
Speaker 3:I kind of wanted to know what made these athletes consistently win, because there were other athletes who were good but didn't have the consistency of winning and I said well, why haven't you got it? Because you've got the ability you knew out and I'm not a psychologist, but I kind of started getting into the psyche and psychology of what makes people consistently win and I've given it away there in the first word, and it's that consistency. But it's not just a consistency in the competition, it's a consistency in everything that they do, from the minute they say I want to go to the Olympics Eight years prior or I want to win Olympic Games eight years prior, to actually standing on the track and the gun going and then delivering that performance to get them to get them that medal.
Speaker 2:You said. Bolts said, wasn't it? He said the end race is the easy part.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. You speak to any Olympic or world champion and say what's the easiest thing you've done? Go and compete at that major championship and win that medal or train for it. Everyone will tell you go into that competition and winning that medal is the easiest bit. It's the hard part, it's the training. And fun enough, the harder you train, the easier it becomes, because that's where all the work's done In the training, in that physically and mentally.
Speaker 2:It's the same in business, right? Exactly, it's certainly the same in business. It's all about your routine, it's about what you put in, it's about how you communicate, how you deliver stuff, how you do this, how you do that, but it's also staying consistent with it.
Speaker 3:Come hell or high water, the good, the bad, the indifferent days, you've got to stay consistent with it. You've got to just keep on going on, and on, and on and on. I always use Linford Christie as an example. I knew Linford in my early 80s, 83, 84 is where I started being in the same arena as I seen Linford Christie. Now Linford Christie in 1983, 94, wasn't the number one 100 meter run. I've seen Linford. I refer to it as Linford earned his stripes. There's one athlete that's earned his stripes, it's Linford Christie. Lots of them have, but I'm using him as an example.
Speaker 3:I used to see him getting knocked out in the heats of the national championships In the three A's. He'd finish third, fourth in the heats. Then next year or year after he'd make it into the final and finish fourth or fifth in the final. And then he'd finish third in the final. And then all of a sudden, he just never, ever gave up when he was being beaten by people. He never, ever gave up. And for me, his world change in 1986, he went to the European Championships on one gold and then from that moment on, that's where the name Linford Christie became kind of a household name and he went on to win absolutely everything a world champion. So Linford came from Commonwealth Europeans and I think at one time he held all four titles at one. Now most people think Linford was born a champion. He wasn't born a champion. He included me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I grew up watching Linford Christie in the 100 meters, which is why I was interested in 100 meters, sprint Right, and I only ever saw Linford Christie winning?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely, he didn't come out his mum's womb winning. He had to go through that process. But the thing that I love about Linford's story and he possibly doesn't I don't think we've had it, he would get and there's a saying, there's a part of Rocky, one of the Rocky films, where he's talking to his son he goes no matter how many times you get knocked down, get up again. And people always say to me what's your version of success? And I always say getting up one more time and you've been knocked down. So you've been knocked down once. Get up what. You've been knocked down a million, get up a million. And one time Linford was knocked down time and time and time again. There was times when I don't know there would be a European clubs competition or a European cup team and Linford wouldn't be picked and there'll be this and that. But he kept on coming back. He took those knocks, he took those hits and it paid off.
Speaker 3:He was not born an Olympic champion. He was not born a champion. He was born destined to be a champion and he didn't let anything get in his way. And I can remember being at Crystal Palace at the 3As and seeing a Linford who wasn't sponsored, you know. I mean, everyone knows him as being sponsored by a PUME. He wasn't sponsored. He had raggedy old kit. He was this, but he was a hungry kid who was never gonna give up and he'd get beaten and he'd come back in the 200, maybe get through to the final, didn't win, come back the next year.
Speaker 3:You see him at races, at clubs, because he was 10s valiars. I'd see him get beaten by people. He would stick it out, stick it out, stick it out. And all of a sudden, in 86, that's when the tables turned and the Linford that you know was born. But the Linford I'd seen before, that was two different people. He earned his stripes. He deserves every single medal, adulation, applause that he gets, because that guy earned his stuff. He walked over glass, hot ashes, you name it, to get to where he got and people don't see that.
Speaker 3:They just say oh this guy had you pronounce his name Linford, oh yeah, he just won. The Europeans Always won the Carol Conwals always won the World's always won the Olympics. Always broken the British record, always done these. That's the Linford that was developed, that's true, he lost, he had it very far. That was the Linford that was developed from the previous Linford and that's what people don't see. Athletes have had to earn their stripes, and that's just one example. Most sportsmen go through that. You're not born known.
Speaker 2:Do you believe it's only his thoughts?
Speaker 3:No, not at all, of course I don't. I believe it's in business. That's what I advocate and talk about. Not at all. I know I'm gonna be corrected on the amount, but if you look at our friend who owns Amazon, jeff Bezos, amazon wasn't his first company. He has been bankrupt, as far as I know, well over a dozen times. And then he started Amazon in his garage when he had a blanket with the word Amazon and all he sold was a few books and.
Speaker 3:But he went through all of these trials and tributes. He did a Linford, he earned his stripes, he got battered, he got beaten, he got knocked down, gone bankrupt. No, this and you look at a lot of what he went through. Colonel Sanders is another one. But I got kicked out of the army, kicked out of home, came up with his idea about this chicken and people said don't be stupid. Started selling it door to door. It failed and he knocked on the doors of so many people before. In his 60s I think he was 62. 65. Was it 65? 65. 65, yeah, I don't remember his 60s.
Speaker 3:I don't remember his 60s, yeah, but he got scared of him Absolutely, and he got absolutely battered down, kept on going. So there's that answer to your question. Of course it happens in business, it happens in life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, in life in general. Yeah, absolutely couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:So you're, then in Barcelona for the Olympics, and this is kind of, would you agree that this is what's made you famous, even more famous than you already were? Yeah, unfortunately.
Speaker 3:Yes, and I say unfortunately, it's not unfortunate, but I mean I won a world championship title. Most people know me more for what I'm doing in Barcelona than I do for that. So, with 100%, this is the thing that people know, and here's a funny thing. If you went out on the street and interviewed 100 people and said, do you know who Derek Redmond is? Yeah, more than most would say no. But if you said, do you remember this happening back in 1992, people would go, oh yeah, I remember that guy.
Speaker 2:And then they got well, that's that. Oh yeah, I get that all the time. I've had this this week, right this week, and last week, when I've been speaking about you coming on to do the podcast you know, they go who.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I go. He had a guy that, like you know, he'd done his hamster.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so I get it all the time.
Speaker 2:It was such an inspirational moment, Derek.
Speaker 3:honestly, I was in Denver a couple of weeks ago doing a presentation and I've done my presentation about 800, 900 people and I've come on stage and I've said, oh, great presentation, fantastic presentation, all these sorts of stuff. And it was typical of comments that I get from presentations and, as you know, I've been speaking for 27 years and I get it all the time. When you went on stage I didn't have a clue who you were, but I saw the video. I didn't realise that was you. Oh my God, my dad and I watched this. That's what my wife and I saw this, my husband and I I showed this to my kids.
Speaker 3:You're on multiple videos from all walks of life.
Speaker 2:And I keep coming across it.
Speaker 3:I know well, you said me one the other day. I said you know, it looks like you won the other day, Two days ago, yeah.
Speaker 1:Literally and I was like I didn't even know you was on this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It's like to do with Michael Phelps and. I would come in and talk about him at a 15 year old and you're on it, so your moment of inspiration has no doubt inspired, without you even knowing, multiple business owners, because it inspires me, it's inspired me, yeah, and other people. It's inspired other athletes, it's inspiring people from all walks of life without you even knowing it, and the funny thing is, you probably don't even know who you are Absolutely.
Speaker 3:I get so many messages from people, even to this day it's 30 plus years ago saying, oh my, I showed this to my son for the first time and he said oh, as I say, it's all my son the plate score. I said to my son so I get a lot of people going. Oh, I said to my son, all my kids, I'm the you know you were coming to speak at our event today and I say I don't know who they are. Oh, that's the guy he did his leg with, you know, and they weren't even born when it happened. In some cases, the parents of the children weren't even born when it happened.
Speaker 3:So yeah, I mean, everyone knows there was a guy who knows that, the guy that did that, everyone knows there was a guy that went down.
Speaker 2:Paul is hammy.
Speaker 3:And his dad came on.
Speaker 2:Well, he was up and it wasn't the dad, it wasn't your dad that changed it for me, right? What changed it for me was when I was watching it. I was a bit like why would someone? That's a mindset, that is a mindset right there. You take that into business or any other walk of life, you will win. And then, as you was hopping around and I'm like that you know in the morning with my coffee and going. This is great. This is great.
Speaker 2:This is great this is what was happening right, and then your dad comes on.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I just lost my dad. I think I just lost my dad. Yeah, I had just lost my dad.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:So then I thought oh, that's like.
Speaker 3:So it hit you double, whammy it hit me double whammy yeah.
Speaker 2:It was inspirational, and I just thought that was inspirational from your dad.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, and.
Speaker 2:I just thought that yeah there's two sides to it.
Speaker 3:I mean, I'll come onto why I did it, but one of the things and my wife said this to me many years ago she says, one of the things that makes it so memorable. She says and as you said, there's two sides to it. You getting up and doing what you did, which is one side of things, but then there's also, what your dad did is the second side. And she says, and really said this. She said do you know, if it was a teammate, your coach now wouldn't have had the same effects. Yeah, the fact that it was your dad. So many more millions of parents and dads not just dads, but parents can resonate with that, because it's what a parent would do for their child. It doesn't have to be an Olympic stadium. The metaphor happened to be set in an Olympic stadium, but all the real event happened. But the metaphor spreads into picking your kid up when they fall at a park or helping them through college or through a situation in life. You know, a setback. It doesn't have to be necessarily even on the sports field.
Speaker 2:It's about sitting down, helping your child with their homework. Yeah, it's about picking your kid up when they drop. Yeah, it's about consoling your son when he misses his penalty.
Speaker 3:Whatever it be, it's the same thing, absolutely. So the connection is the same. It's the same yet, and that's why it just so happens to do it on the world stage.
Speaker 3:Yeah, which it wasn't planned. I mean, obviously it wasn't planned. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. So the next four years was just laser focused on making up for what happened in 88. And I couldn't be any more hungry, any more focused, any more desperate to win two medals, because that's what I was going to Barcelona for. And again, I had problems in this and that and blah, blah, blah blah, but we managed to get myself there. So there were four rounds, a heat of second round, the semifinal and the final. And again what I said earlier, I just had a job to do. Job one was the heat. So it's the first three to qualify. I always win my heats, not that I want to run super fast, but I just want first of all send a mental message to everyone in the racer. But also, if you win your heats, the next race you go in, you go into the draw for a lane, you go into the lane draw or the draw for the middle lanes, lanes three, four, five or six, if you qualify and you don't win your heats, you go into the draw for lanes one, two, seven or eight. They're not there. It's not that bad, but I want to make the best possible situation for me. So it's all about a little bit of focus, so it's a little bit of selfishness. I'm going to get me one of them. Four lanes, and I did just enough to win and I ran quite a quick time. I was in great shape and I jogged over the line.
Speaker 3:I remember going back to my coach after the heat and saying I'm running too quick. My coach said no, you're not, you're just in great form. I didn't expect to run that. I expected to run 45 and a half seconds and qualify. I ended up running 45 flat, which back then was a decent time for the heats, and 45-0-3. I ran and my coach said no, you're just in great shape. And I was panicking, thinking, oh God, I'm about to hit a pizza. You're in great shape. And I didn't even break a sweat. And my coach said do exactly the same tomorrow, because that's all you're going to need to do. So the second day, in the second round, instead of running 45-0-3, I ran 45-0-2. So 100th of a second quicker and I won by even further and again, just easy, didn't break up. Could have done it in a pair of wellies and qualified nice and easy. It's going to be like when I beat you over 100.
Speaker 3:Anyway, moving on, then it came to the semi the night before the semi, then it came to the night before the semi and I sat down with my dad and my coach and I'd run quite easy. So it was a semi-final, a day's rest, and the day after that was the final. So we decided no messing about, run this one a little bit harder, don't go so easy. And I won't bore you with the way that I ran each of the rounds. But I ran the first 200 exactly the same as if it wasn't the final. So it's a bit of a, a bit of a. Each round is a bit of a practice run. So I'll run the first 200, like it's the time I want them in the final, and then, depending on how far I'm in front, I'll switch off and do enough just to qualify, and I do the same the next day. And so first we're going to do exactly the same in the semi-final and I'm feeling good, everything's going well, the confidence is there.
Speaker 3:Physically, I'm in shape. Mentally, I'm in shape and you need to win at that level. You need to be firing on both of your cylinders One's the physical cylinder and one's the mental cylinder. You ain't going to win with one of those. You can be physically in shape, but if you're not there mentally ain't going to work and you can be mentally in shape and obviously not there physically it's not going to work.
Speaker 1:And I was there with both of those.
Speaker 3:And I remember again the last time I saw my dad before the race, we sat in and he turned around to me and he said it's just a matter of time, it's that little thing. I went yeah, you know I've gone, so I go do your thing and I went off. Everything's great, I want to track. I know what I've got to do. There's 70,000 people in the state and whatever it was, don't care, there could have been 70 billion people, made no difference. I know what I'm doing, this and that I know what I've got to do. I know the first 90, what I've got to do. Pick up into the back straight, blah, blah, blah. I've got my race plan.
Speaker 3:So we go out onto the track and you know all the mind games of the athletes when you get on. Just doesn't love me. I'm doing what I need to do. Couldn't give a monkeys about anybody else. This is the selfish side number one. And then you've got to have that confidence, and I say this there is a thin line between confidence and arrogance and you have to walk it.
Speaker 3:I'm walking out there knowing you lot are going to have to try and beat me. I ain't got to beat you, you've got to try and beat me. I'm not saying that to anybody because that would be arrogant, but confidence wise, I'm just looking. I've got the reigning Olympic champion training partner of mine, steve Lewis, when I was at UCLA in the race. Lovely guy, he's already run quicker than me. He's the reigning Olympic champion. He's already won two Olympic medals. I know I'm going to beat him in that semi-final. I know I'm going to beat him in that semi-final. All the other guys will it? Roberto Hernandez, one of the fastest in the world. I already beat him in the heat. Mate, you're dust. I know this is going to happen. So on your mask, get set and I was the fastest reaction out of the blocks, get into my running. I'm going down the back straight.
Speaker 1:Now, here's the weird thing.
Speaker 3:As I'm running down the back straight, I heard this noise and internally I thought it was something in the crowd and it was my hamstring going. But the thing that went through my head was come on, Redmond, concentrate, Because when you are focused and everything's going well, everything's blocked out around you. Yes, you can hear the crowd roaring, but I couldn't pick out you in row seven, seat number 213. Going, go on there. I can't hear that. I'm just hearing a drone and I can hear my tch-tch-tch on my feet and all this sort of stuff. I can hear other athletes around me. I know I can hear my breathing and all that sort of stuff and I hear this noise, and the first thought was come on, concentrate, because I'm thinking this out.
Speaker 3:And I carried on running at the same speed. I've just pulled hamstring. Well, it's just popped. I mean, it was only about three or four strides later that I felt the pain and everything and instantly I realized what it was and the first feeling was oh, not again. Disappointment was just frustration, disappointment, annoyance. This is not so. It's very painful, very painful. And again, not to upset you, but in a 400, I would run the back straight in 10.2 seconds, and that's in a 400. So I've run the first 100. The back straight will be 10.2 and then roughly so, 10.2.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, how fast would you beat with a pulled hamstring.
Speaker 3:Well, I was going at one point anyway.
Speaker 1:So I don't think that's going to work. It's fine. So I'm not paying, not paying and I pull up and this and that.
Speaker 3:And I remember slapping the track and going oh, why me, why me and all this sort of stuff. Now, this is a funny thing. That went on for about 10, 15 seconds, so the race is still continuing. Yeah, the athletes have got about 120 meters to go there, although they haven't quite got into the home straight, maybe 130 meters. And I remember just stopping all my whining and moaning. I remember something just said to me it's the Olympic semifinal.
Speaker 3:I remember quickly looking up and seeing, and by this time there'd been a couple of medical staff to try and get on. I'm just pushing them out of the way and getting up. And the thought that went through my mind was if I get, because the qualifying procedure was first four in the semi will go through to the final two days later. Yeah, I've got 250 meters to go in a hole about the size of the 50-pence piece in my hamstring. They've got 120, 130 meters to go and they're all fine and they're flying. And the thought that went through my mind is, if I get up now and start running, I'll catch them and I'll finish, I'll qualify, yeah.
Speaker 3:Now that was my mental state. That's your Olympic mindset coming up.
Speaker 3:So, the cylinders were firing the mental one is going, the physical one's gone and that's broken down, but this one's gone. So my mind is saying get up and carry them around it. So I got up and I start hobbling. I get to 200 meters, or a hobble 50 meters, and I get to 200 meter mark and you'd think I would have clocked. But the physical, the mental cylinder piston is still going. And I get to the 200 meter mark and my thought was wasn't it's over? Was, let me have a look across the track and see how much I'm gaining on them. And when I looked across sort of the field, if you like, and where the field events are, and across the track, it was empty, obviously, and the race had finished. And it was only at that time that I realized that it was over. So, if you like, the mental side had now caught up with the physical side and they're both sort of down here.
Speaker 3:And then instantly I decided to make preparations for 1996. And that was. I decided that if I finished the race, at least I could go for the next four years saying I finished eighth and got knocked out, which I thought was better than saying I didn't finish at all. So I decided I was going to finish this race. I just want to finish, because I could live with myself finishing eighth and getting knocked out, but I couldn't live with not finishing at all and that was the reason I just wanted to carry on. I'd already committed and I was going to finish this race. And then the last thing I, because for me it was that's the foundations to work on for the next four years.
Speaker 3:Okay, first Olympics didn't even make it onto the track. Second Olympics at least we made the semi-final Third Olympics and the foundations were solid and that was going to give me something to work on. Last thing I expected was obviously my dad to come out onto the track and obviously what happened happened. So that was the mind, the process that my mind went through, and I remember seeing it back for the first time hours later, hours later, and when I was in the apartment that I was staying in and there's a load of other athletes there John, regis, was there. This person, that person blah blah, blah, and it came on the TV in Spanish and blah, blah, blah, and the guys were like, oh, they just stopped and they didn't know what to do and they just kind of looked at me and Regis is one of my best friends. He was like what do we do? What do we do? And this sounds like he was being horribly bossy, but he's got like a smirk on his face.
Speaker 3:He's like oh shit, this is a real weird situation. What do we do? What do we do? And I looked at the TV and the first thing I said was because that's all we hobbled and I thought, bloody hell, I thought I was running a bit quicker than that and everyone just burst out laughing and you know, and it hugged me and this and that and said you know what, blah, blah, blah, blah and all this sort of stuff. But it was one of those things where I had no idea the reaction it was gonna get. I didn't do it for Queen in country, I didn't do it for Team GB, I didn't do it for my family. I had to do that For me, you call it selfish, but that most and the world could have gone.
Speaker 3:What a complete plonker, or what a hero. I was Thankful and grateful. They went.
Speaker 2:You've obviously seen that that clip numerous times, like, like.
Speaker 1:I have right yeah.
Speaker 2:I've seen it well over a hundred times, just that particular part, yeah, and what happens is, as soon as you get up, the whole crowd go, because you just it's interesting, isn't it? People Don't want to push themselves to get to that position, but when they see someone else doing it, yeah, yeah they just so. Inspired.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a weird thing because you're right, people want to see that, but not everyone would do that, and but I think it's a it's a natural thing, because I had no idea I didn't have a contingency plan if my puller hamster gonna get up and run.
Speaker 3:Yeah that just happened. When it happened I had no idea that injury was the biggest shock in the world to me because everything was going out. The problems that I had was with my Achilles tendon and we managed to Circumnavigate the Achilles problem. My medical team, personal and team GB worked around the clock To and there's again. I keep naming people.
Speaker 3:There was a physio called Mike Gamston who used to work with me personally and he was part of the GB team. He came up with this technique of how to tape up my leg and he studied this thing. It's like a wishbone way. He did it to take the pressure off my Achilles. It took him about 40 minutes every day to tape up my Achilles tendon because the match stripped he had to use in a way that he had to do and I can't many times researched it this and that, but and I had to do that whether I was racing or training every day would take 30 to 40 minutes Just to tape up one of my Achilles tendon in this particular way.
Speaker 3:So people went above and beyond and it was. You know, my kid is problem and then to have this hamstring go was just taking the. Michael, I won't swear was just taking them, you know, and I just couldn't believe it. So it was a shock that that happened and the reaction was just the reaction I had I had to finish that race. For me. Well, part one, what got me to my feet was I still thought I could qualify, I still. And if, if, when it went down I say this a lot if I don't know Someone had come down with a magic remote and go and the whole world had stopped and everyone froze in the moment that they were, and only me and that person who was you, and you said, derek, we're gonna bet if you're gonna finish it, and I would say, yeah, bet everything I own, including my mortgage, I will qualify, because that was a state of mind that I was in Interesting.
Speaker 2:I'd say you would. You would almost convinced your mental self-conscious you know what I mean? Say it sounds to me like you took your mental self-conscious.
Speaker 3:I didn't convince my mental self-conscious, my, my conscience Convinced me that I was it because I've done all the work. I knew I was one. Of course I'm gonna qualify now. I wasn't taking it for granted. I knew there was some work to be done. And Again we're onto that thin line between confidence and arrogance. The confidence I knew I'd proven to myself, the training all the years, the, the nights, the cold nights, the Working out the tactics, running the first two rounds everything, all the time.
Speaker 3:Everything that had worked, I'm gonna qualify. I need to execute. I need to do this. I know I can. The weather's good.
Speaker 3:I was in lane 5, everything I needed to do, everything was working. You know, my spikes were broken in and the right spike. We've done everything right and Unless something out of my control was gonna happen, if it was all under my control, I was gonna qualify. I Was gonna run a time that would have got me into into that final and something that was out of my control happened. That stopped me from doing it.
Speaker 3:But I still try to then put that back into control and take back control of it and say I can still qualify, even though this has been thrown at me. And that's what got me to my feet. And for the first 50 meters of hobbling I was still convinced that I was gonna qualify and I wasn't looking at the rest of the is. They're actually still sprinting at whatever pace they're going. It's only when I got to 200 when I looked across the track to see if they was how much I was gaining on them. Of course I wasn't gonna be gaining on them when I sit back and look at it now. But, like I say, if you have that magic remote. I was it. Course I'm gonna play press play.
Speaker 2:Let me qualify because your mindset is your mind says that your mind sets in red, isn't it? Your mind sets in red because it's like you're so confident that you've done all this work. You've done everything that you should do in the preparation for it, so why wouldn't you?
Speaker 3:go, I mean as interesting as a saying.
Speaker 3:If you think that you can or you think that you can't, you're most probably right. Yeah, because if you believe you can do it, yeah, you got a chance. If you don't believe you can do it, there's a chance you're not gonna do it. Yeah, and I can't go into anything Not being confident. You know you name me a boxer even if they're fighting Muhammad Ali Mike Tyson that's gone into a ring and said I'm gonna get my face smashed in here, but yeah, I'll get to get the face they go in and I said, yeah, I'm gonna.
Speaker 3:I'm gonna be the one that's gonna, you know, beat him. I'm gonna be the first one. I'm gonna be the one. I raised Michael Johnson, I don't know how many times. Every time I raised him I thought I can be. I remember standing in a couple lanes outside I know we like to use in my lane for once in a race. I'm just staring at I'm standing all stripped off ready to race. Second, before the start of the race, I went right, let me check something. Yep, he's got two arms. Yeah, he's got two legs. He's only got one head, two ears, one nose, two eyes, one mouth. Yeah, we've got the same. He's got the same to me. So this is gonna be my day to do what he's done, because if he can do it, why?
Speaker 1:can't I do it?
Speaker 3:What? How do I know? This isn't the day that I go from here to here, as it did on a 27th July 1985 when I ran in Oslo. I went from being ranked seventh in Great Britain to five in the world. Michael Johnson went from here to here and then, once he got there, he can't say well, how do we know? Today it's not my day to match him or to get a lot closer to him.
Speaker 2:It's about putting in the effort every time that you go and do it, isn't it?
Speaker 3:physically and mentally Understand. Yeah, so my daughter what she? One of my daughters, grace. She got into athletics for a while and she made it into the English schools and it was a 300 meters final because for her age group we didn't run for three and I had the pleasure of Giving out the medals to gold, silver and bronze in the race and it had to be her race. And I saw her before the race and she's like oh dad, I've got this person in my race. She's run this time. I've got this person that rest, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 3:And I think on paper grace was Fif or six best and I said so. I said that's what they've done in the past. You got a blank piece of paper grace. You can now Change history or make history because that is your peepee, but that was run then. That's this girl's peepee anyway. She ended up finishing second and she beat four or five of the girls that Previously had personal best quicker than her.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I just said to her don't go on what they have done, go on what you're gonna do today. Forget all that, because that's all in the past. How do you know today you don't break the world record for 300 meters, because it could happen. Why can't it happen? So just forget all that. Don't be psyched out by what they have done. Be focused on what you can do now and and and.
Speaker 3:That was the attitude that I had. Yeah, people were faster than me on paper, but guess what? You don't run on paper. And I raised Michael Johnson. God knows how many times I'm times I've beaten, once when he didn't show up. But that wasn't the point. The point was today is my day, and something else my dad once told me was every time you run the 400, go out to break the world record. Because you don't try and break the world record, guess what? You'll never break the world record. I can sit here and wish I Make a million pounds, we can all do, but if you don't go out there in attempt to make a million pounds and guess what, you ain't gonna make a million pounds, whether that's just going and doing the lottery and praying and hoping that you win the lottery, at least you're having to go.
Speaker 3:Whether that's going out there and setting up a business. Whether it's going out there begging. Whether it's going out there, do whatever to make that money. If you don't go out and do it, you got no, or attempt to do it, you got no chance of doing it. You give yourself better rods by trying than you do, by not trying and just thinking about it. It's just basic common sense.
Speaker 2:So I think I think that there's some stuff that I want to speak to you about, about how you felt afterwards, but I don't think I think we've covered. There's so many different Nuances between sports and business and life in general. I think it's awesome. Thank you, what? What advice would you give? Because you're obviously happy to come and talk to any company. Yeah or any individual or whatever You're, you're happy to kind of offer your services because you now have a motivational, motivational speaking business.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've been speaking for 26, 27 years. Do sort of personal coaching as well. Personal development coaching yeah, and yes, we've got a number of subjects, yeah okay, so you're happy to speak to anyone.
Speaker 2:They could just reach out to Derek directly, will tag him in the podcast and any posts on socials and stuff like that. If there's one thing that you would say that would help let's say me as a business person From what you've learned in sports what would that one quote be?
Speaker 3:I think the one thing that I would really say to people, the one thing that you've got to have and develop, is self-belief. You've Got to have that self-belief because if you don't believe in yourself, no one else is going to believe in you. People didn't believe in you in your business. I won't be working for you.
Speaker 1:And if people didn't?
Speaker 3:believe your vision. There's not to be all of it, but if people didn't believe that you wouldn't have people commit to you, you wouldn't have people don't say you know what. He's onto something here. I want to be a part of this. So for me, one of the most important ingredients and it's possibly the start of things is Having that dream and believing that you can achieve it and it can be. I'm gonna take over the world, like in those films.
Speaker 2:One million dollars or it might be.
Speaker 3:I just want to lose a bit of weight. I just want to take some money. I just want to move house. I, whatever it be, get that and believe in it. Believe that you can achieve it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that is very important, thank you my pleasure.
Speaker 1:so much, derek, my pleasure, appreciate it yeah, nice good, really appreciate it Brilliant.