Having started to write himself off, the 2017 world champion explains why he feels ready to be a contender again and why he wants to give athletes a bigger say in their sport

This is the really hard part. That point in the year when the groundwork is being laid and an athletes agenda is filled with the necessary evil of the unvarnished hard graft that leaves bodies battered and energy drained.

You wake up tired, you go training, you come home, you recover youre just stuck in that cycle, says Adam Gemili. Its the hardest part of the sport. This is the part that no one really sees but it means the most. If you dont do this right, it can really mess up your whole year.

He may be weary, but the 30-year-old could not be happier. After the mental and physical torment of the past three years, to be in the thick of winter training with motivation restored and his own personal ship steadied feels priceless. Gemili just wants to give himself a chance. He cant shake the belief that, should the stars align, he can be a contender on the world stage once again.

It helps that the outside noise has quietened. It was at last years British Indoor Championships that the 4x100m world champion revealed he had almost quit athletics and explored trying to play professional football (he used to be part of Chelseas academy system). The reason was the controversy he found himself embroiled in around his then coach, Rana Reider, who was placed under investigation for sexual misconduct. The American is free to coach but is currently under a 12-month probation for a relationship that presented a power imbalance with one of his athletes. He was not found to be in violation of any other misconduct claims.

Gemili didnt make it past the 200m heats at the World Championships in Oregon, citing the bad press at the time, and while fellow training partners such as Daryll Neita had left Reiders Florida-based group almost immediately, Gemili only departed in August of 2022, almost a year after being told to cut ties by UK Athletics.

That situation has cleared up now but, mentally, I wasnt prepared for any of that, he admits of the circumstances which had wide-reaching consequences for him. Ive always been happy-go-lucky and Id never had a panic attack before, Id never had an anxiety attack. I was barely able to do one session a week so the fact that I even got through that year, it was insane. We had so much crap to deal with.

You do think about certain things and maybe I should have come home earlier, maybe I shouldnt have been as loyal. But you live and die by your decisions. I cant change them now and I dont like to think of what if Id done this? You have to always look forward and learn from your mistakes, because you dont learn from success.

During that period, Gemili had lost direction and put on weight. His was not a positive world.

I was writing myself off, he says. Online there are a lot of fans that have really supported me but you sometimes get people that dont and in more recent years that number has grown. In my head, I started to doubt my own ability and began to think: What if theyre right? What if its my time to go?

Change has worked wonders, though. He now trains and lives in Italy, working under Marco Airale whose training group features a large British contingent including Neita, Reece Prescod, Amy Hunt and Gemilis housemate Jeremiah Azu. Even at a low ebb, the Blackheath and Bromley athlete could still sense potential in himself.

I saw what I was able to do when I was in that bad way and I thought: When Im mentally good, and Im back to how I used to be where Im not scared of anyone, I just go out there and I run my own race I will get the results I deserve, he adds.

When I joined Marco, he said to me: I can see youre physically not where you need to be and mentally not where you need to be. This is not going to just take a few months or one year. He said: Give me two seasons going into the Olympic Games. The first year, if we get any good results, its a bonus. But judge me now on this coming year. Were both so locked in and focused on the goal. This is the year now where it matters.

There are fantastic athletes in the group and its so good to be around. I feel like I bring a lot of experience and I can help a lot of the younger guys, especially technically if I see something I can say maybe to try this or maybe think of this cue things that helped me when I was that age and when I was coming into the sport.

My first year in the sport I got to train with Jeanette Kwakye and at the time she was the only female Olympic finalist for GB ever in the 100m and she taught me so much the kind of things that might not mean a lot to the athletes now but, when they get a bit older and think about it, it will help them a lot, so I try and play that role.

While he still holds on-track ambitions, Gemili is indeed looking outside of himself. He is in his final year of eight serving on the UKA Athletes Commission and has done a similar spell with the British Olympic Association. Just recently, he was voted to serve on the World Athletics equivalent.

He is an athlete who thinks a lot about his sport. When asked what he would change about it if he were in charge, he exhales deeply. Thats a big question, he says but it doesnt take long until he finds his rhythm.

When I first came into the sport, I got to go to a home Olympics [London 2012] and I thought: Wow, this is what its going to be like every champs. This sport is amazing and its just going to continue to grow in popularity but it just didnt.

I understand our sport gets funding from UK Sport and were judged on medals at the top level and that decides how much funding we get for the next Olympic cycle so thats where a lot of the attention goes. But theres been a lack of push towards the grassroots, the foundations, these young athletes and the opportunities they get. Thats what I would like to see different, first and foremost.

I also believe the athletes are at the bottom of the pecking order. Unless youre in that top one per cent, its seen as: If you dont want to do that, or if you dont want to run here, if you dont want to accept that contract, someone else will and it is what it is.

The people running the sport, a lot of them are the sponsors and the sponsors hold a lot of the cards and make a lot of the decisions. Obviously, theyre only going to do what benefits them as a company and a business.

Eventually Id like to see it change where a lot more power is given back to the athletes and they have more say.

He adds: From what Ive seen the top, top athletes are okay. And because theyre okay they dont want to kick up a fuss. And these are the athletes with the power but they just sort of finish their time and then you just never hear from them in the sport again.

These athletes can have such a big impact, but theyre just not utilised in any sort of way. Again, thats something I would look to change. Thankfully, were starting to see it where some past athletes are now getting into important roles in the governance side of it, which is exactly where it should be.

Aside from trying to fix athletics problems, its the task of trying to qualify for what would be a fourth and almost certainly last Olympics which sits at the very top of Gemilis to do list. His last experience of the Games, in Tokyo, was painful in more ways than one. He headed to Japan having gone toe to toe in training alongside the eventual 200m champion Andre de Grasse, only to injure his hamstring in the final warm-up. Taped up and determined to compete, Gemili hobbled over the line in tears.

With experience comes more patience and though he is desperate to book a Paris place, the first British man ever to run sub 10 seconds for 100m and sub 20 for 200m isnt about to try to skip a few steps.

Success for me now is just running free and running without pressure, he says. Thats not pressure from anyone else, its pressure that I put on myself. When I dont perform and by performing I mean challenging the worlds best and running world class times what am I doing?

Last season, I was running some crazy times in training and they just didnt match up in competition. I cramped up before five races because I was putting so much mental stress and pressure on myself that, by the time I actually ran, I was totally drained.

Why put himself through it, then?

This is not an easy sport to be in. You do it because you love it. Ive never felt more confident in my own ability. People havent seen the best of me yet. Im certain of that and I will do everything in my power to make sure that, by summer, Im absolutely flying.