Paralympics - Becoming an athlete was never my dream, says Paralympic medallist Hannah Cockroft
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Updated 11/03/2021 at 17:28 GMT
Team GB Paralympian Hannah Cockroft has five Paralympic gold medals to her credit as well as 12 world titles, but she says now that being a champion athlete was never her ambition as a child because she had no idea what opportunities there were.
Hannah Cockroft
Image credit: Reuters
Hannah Cockroft - a 12-time world champion wheelchair racer - has revealed that becoming a Paralympian was never her ambition.
She says that she had no idea that there were chances for her to compete at the very highest level of athletics.
In fact, she was 15 years old before she even sat in a racing wheelchair - and was talent-spotted and mentored by the legendary Tanni Grey-Thompson and husband Dr Ian Thompson after a British Paralympic Association talent day at Loughborough University.
"It was never my dream [to be a Paralympian]," she said to the See Sporty Be Sporty podcast. "It was just an opportunity that got passed my way and it helped that I’d met people who’d been there and done that."
She took to it straight away. Aged just 18 in 2010, she broke seven world records in eight days, and now has five Paralympic gold medals to her name.
But she wonders now if she might have achieved more and even earlier had she had more role models to show her what possibilities there were, adding: "What could I have done had I had that opportunity? And how many other kids are missing out?"
The 28-year-old, who suffered damage to areas of her brain at birth which means she has mobility problems, competes in the sprint and middle distance T34 classification.
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