Looking back with pride on a year never to be forgotten

10:31am Saturday 1st November 2008

Comments (0)   Have your say »

Katy Livingston is a Redcar-born modern pentathlete who finished seventh in this year’s Olympic Games in Beijing. In the latest of our series of features in the run-up to the 2012 Games in London, she looks back on a magnificent 12 months.

I’VE just finished my last World Cup event of the year, so it’s a good time to sit back and try to take stock of everything that’s happened this year.

Whichever way you look at it, I have to be pleased with what I’ve achieved. It hasn’t been perfect, but it’s been much better than I could have expected at this time last year.

At the start of the season, I had only one ambition and that was getting to the Olympics. It was the first time I’d been in with a shot of competing in an Olympic Games and I didn’t want to let that pass me by.

In the end, I achieved that and a whole lot more. I made it to Beijing, and even though things didn’t go quite as I would have wanted them to at the start of the Olympic competition, I don’t think I let anyone down.

The Olympics were obviously the highlight of the year, but there have been other things I’m really proud of as well.

I performed well at World Cup events, picking up medals along the way, and finished the season ranked third in the world. That’s a really good base to build from over the next couple of years.

My team-mate, Heather Fell, is currently ranked number one, so it’s not as though I have to look far for someone to aim at. In fact, with another British girl, Mhairi Spence, also ranked in the world’s top 12, it’s fair to say that Britain leads the world in women’s modern pentathlon at the moment.

BECAUSE it’s been such a busy year, our coaches have given us a couple of easy months in the run-up to Christmas.

It’s not time off as such, I’m still doing a fair bit of running and swimming, it’s just the skill-based events that have been put to bed for a while. It’s nice to have a little bit of time to myself for a change. You don’t really have time to think when the season is in full swing.

I’ve been to a few Olympicbased events and the highlight was obviously the parade through London last month.

It was incredible, definitely my best day since the Olympics themselves. I couldn’t believe that so many people turned out to see us. We got to Trafalgar Square and all you could see were thousands and thousands of heads. Then we went to Buckingham Palace and I got to meet the Queen. Not exactly your normal afternoon!

There are a few more events still to come and it’s nice to get the chance to do things like this because modern pentathletes aren’t exactly stars for most of the year.

I’m looking forward to being at The Northern Echo’s Local Heroes Awards – although I suppose I have to say that don’t I! – and I’m also going to be giving out some of the awards at my old school’s presentation night. It’s Sacred Heart School and it’ll be good to catch up with some of my old PE teachers, because they really set me on the way to being a sportswoman.

I’m also going to be part of a parade of Olympic athletes on the pitch at Wembley before the Barbarians play Australia in a rugby union match in December.

I’m a Sheffield Wednesday supporter thanks to my dad, so I suppose that’s probably going to be my only chance of getting to Wembley for quite a while!