Men of Influence magazine


Sam Quek, 2016 Olympic hockey medallist, speaking on BBC TV

“As the story unfolded yesterday, I was getting more and more frustrated. I’d see these headlines popping up saying how Biles was weak, she wasn’t mentally strong enough to deal with the pressure.

“On social media, people were accusing her of using it as an excuse to pull out of the vault because she wasn’t performing as well. I just think it’s absolute nonsense.

“She said she wasn’t in the right mental frame of mind to go and perform well enough and that she could have caused herself some damage. Every sports person knows that if you go in half-cocked, you’re going to cause yourself an injury: none more so than in gymnastics.

“She has laid down a foundation for so many athletes and people around the world to say: ‘In this moment in time, inside, something didn’t feel right’. She had the bravery and the courage to pull out of the event.

“We talk about mental health and physical health. They are both just as important as each other.

“To the people who are accusing her of not being a team player: in my mind, she could not have been more of a team player. She recognised that the moves that she was doing, she wouldn’t have been able to execute and get the scores needed for gold.

“Simone could have hid in the background. But she didn’t. She put her tracksuit back on, got out there and stood and clapped her team-mates.

“That, to me, is a champion.”



Source link

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *