At 13, I was a great high jumper and combined eventer with a lot of potential. By the time I was 17, my future in athletics had more or less come to an end, and it had nothing to do with injuries or a lack of passion for athletics. I felt alone, had no guidance, not enough money, and had made little progress over the few years that I had been competing. Growing up in Cornwall and being isolated from the athletics community was a big part of that, but ultimately my decision to leave the sport cam…

Stressors can often feel overwhelming for athletes. Constant judgement from being in a results-driven environment, concerns about contracts not being renewed, receiving criticism from significant others, demanding schedules, and the inevitable injuries are all stressors that athletes must frequently navigate. Stressors such as these have the potential to undermine their mental health, with studies indicating that athletes are prone to experiencing clinical anxiety and depression. Accordingly, it…

📸 by Geoff Lowe

When I was around 4 years old, I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder known as Selective Mutism. For those who don’t know what this is, it’s when a child or adult does not refuse or choose not to speak at certain times, they’re literally unable to speak. The expectation to talk to certain people triggers a freeze response with feelings of panic, like a bad case of stage fright, and talking is impossible.

Although I got help when I was younger, this anxiety disorder manife…

Author Biography:

Name: Brydon Duncan

Age: 17

Event: Discus Throw

Performance Level: National Level

Contribution topic area: Mental Health

Who Am I?

My name is Brydon Duncan, I’m from Bromley, south-east London and I’m approaching my 18th birthday. I started athletics in 2019, as an upper U15. The reason I started doing discus is largely due to the fact that I was so much bigger than my peers, throughout my entire childhood. I’ve always been a large person, reaching 6ft tall before my 1…

If you could talk to your younger self, I wonder what you’d say?

Would you tell yourself to stop putting so much pressure on yourself?

Would you tell yourself that fast times aren’t determined by what you eat?

Would you tell yourself that thinner doesn’t equal faster?

I certainly would.

I had known for a while that something wasn’t quite right. Irregular menstrual cycles... cold hands and feet... always tired... lean, but not strong. I knew there was something, but didn’t want to admit it. …

I. Am. Fed. Up.

Fed up of hearing sports commentators discuss a professional athlete’s weight, size and body shape. Fed up of watching runners – and more importantly, friends – lose their way in the sport in attempts to achieve some sort of aesthetic or “ideal.” Fed up of hearing how scary sugar and fat and carbohydrate is. Fed up of being unable to help.

I’m fed up of the obsession we have with athlete’s bodies. Do they have a period? Have they lost/gained weight? Are they eating enough? Are …

Post-viral fatigue syndrome is nothing new. Yet in the light of the Covid-19 pandemic, it has become a far more prevalent issue, with swathes of people struggling to make a full recovery from the initial infection. Dubbed “long Covid”, the drawn-out symptoms include severe fatigue, breathlessness, and anxiety. Below, I share my experience of post-viral fatigue, how I failed to avoid it, and what I am going to do differently this time around to ensure I don’t make the same mistakes. I hope this a…

1. Introduction

Everyone knows the last few months have been stressful - and it’s been different for all of us.

On one hand, you see some people are on top of the world; athletes in Dubai at the NAS complex, living life, soaking in the sun, getting some top class training in. 

On the other end of the spectrum though, you see a group of athletes travelling over an hour from Cardiff to Aberdare just to get 40 minutes of hammer throwing in the books.

How can you stay level headed - regardl…

For the sake of being concise, I’ll start my story in 2017. That year was the high. I'd gotten married, I’d won my second British Masters M35 title over 200m with a lifetime PB, and then gone on to the European Champs later that summer – where I’d picked up an individual bronze and a relay gold.

It felt like vindication; for all the training, for all the hard work. But, most importantly, it felt like a victory over my mental health – that I could accomplish something despite the all-consuming d…

Let me start by saying, not a single professional athlete on the planet is healthy. Is it healthy to put that much stress through your knee every time you jump onto a high jump bed? Or the amount of physical pain you endure training for an Olympic 10,000m? Or bending your arm into all sorts of wacky positions to ping a javelin 90m? None of this, in the long run will make you any healthier. It does however mean, that we, as athletes, are the fittest people on the planet, and this is a distinction…