Olympic 400m bronze medallist on the ‘magic Monday’ at Sydney 2000, her toughest training workouts and why Jodie Williams can break the UK record

When you raced Cathy Freeman in front of 112,000 people in the Olympic 400m final at Sydney 2000, do you remember it clearly or was it a blur? 

I remember September 25, 2000, as clear as day. Honestly, it’s like it was yesterday and not 22 years ago. I can close my eyes and see from the viewpoint that I had in lane three in that women’s 400m Olympic final with pure clarity and feel the same as I did back in 2000. The whole occasion encapsulated was madness and that could have been a bit of a blur as it came and went. 

When it came to the race, though, I remember the flashbulbs down the straight, going round the top bend and the wheels falling off in the final 100m because of the lactic acid! I was thinking to myself, “have I got a medal?” and remember then looking up at the giant scoreboard to see if my name appeared in the top three. [Winning bronze] is still something I’m extremely proud of. 

What was the toughest session you used to do when training for the 400m? 

This question is quite hard to answer as I’ve erased most of the training sessions from my mind as they were a little bit brutal. Under the guidance of Linford Christie and coach Ron Roddan, they used to set some very interesting sessions. I think people are surprised when they hear I didn’t run very far on the track. I never ran over 500m [for a repetition] during any given track session so it was a real mixture of speed and speed endurance. 

The worst/toughest session I’d say was when we’d start at 500m and we’d go down in 100m increments and then we’d go back up from 100m. We used to get a decent amount of recovery as we had 12-13 minutes but psychologically it was as tough as anything we did. 

The British record in the 400m is currently held at 49.41 by Christine Ohuruogu. Do you think anyone has a realistic chance of getting close to it and, if so, who do you think that will be? 

Can anyone break it any time soon? The one major talent that of course jumps out from the last couple of years is Jodie Williams. She’s made considerable progress and getting under 50 seconds now (49.97 PB) is really exciting. She is coming from that sprinter-based background and has a 200m PB of 22.46 which she has now transferred over the quarter-mile distance. 

I think she has the capability of running faster and I think she’s the one at this moment in time that has a realistic chance over the next two to three years of getting close to that record. 

Is athletics a hard sell? What do you make of the health of the sport right now and what can be done to increase its exposure outside of an Olympic/Paralympic cycle? 

Is athletics a hard sell? No. It never has been and it never will be. Athletics is the main sport in the world and don’t come to me with football because I’m a big football fan. Even armchair fans every four years will tune in to track and field. 

What it has to have is the exposure and the visibility to continue to be seen as great as it is – and that’s being on mainstream TV, having as many meets covered as possible and promoting track and field where there is equal balance given to every single event. The personalities in the sport need to be promoted more and we do have them in the sport. 

READ MORE: Cathy Freeman’s Olympic 400m victory

What can be done to increase the exposure outside of that four-year cycle? It’s all about visibility and you have to see something to invest your time in it.

You have to be bought into a sport to care [about it] and enjoy it. The health of the sport right now, some would say, could be in a better place but it is not a hard sell if you can see it. That is Olympic and Paralympic sport and the progress in disability sport, especially with Channel 4, has been fantastic over the past decade.