What are your tips to someone wanting to get healthy and into exercise?
You have to set a goal, however small, it could be jogging a 5k with a neighbour or participating in your first half marathon, whatever it is write it down and give yourself a date of completion. It doesn’t matter if it’s in six months’ time, a year or two years but have a deadline that you need to meet.
Find someone you can train with as well. When I go on my jogs around the village I always find another lady who likes to go, and we have a gossip and run at a gentle pace. It doesn’t need to be sprinting, but the point is that we’re both getting exercise and having a little chat along the way, and being able to encourage one and other is a lovely part of it.
Once you’re out there doing exercise and the adrenaline and endorphins get going, you’ll never regret doing it – being healthy and looking after yourself is vital. I also love using the rowing machine. There are a number of benefits to using this piece of equipment for different disciplines as it allows you to train outside the box and practice different techniques while using the same muscles you do in your usual training routine. It trains your glutes and legs and it’s very similar to a leg press.
I focus on explosiveness especially in my glutes, hip flexes, legs and quads and the rowing machine allows an athlete to train those muscles. So you can see how you could cross over the two and use the machine as a different training technique for your discipline.
What are your tips to someone wanting to get healthy and into exercise?
You have to set a goal, however small, it could be jogging a 5k with a neighbour or participating in your first half marathon, whatever it is write it down and give yourself a date of completion. It doesn’t matter if it’s in six months’ time, a year or two years but have a deadline that you need to meet.
Find someone you can train with as well. When I go on my jogs around the village I always find another lady who likes to go, and we have a gossip and run at a gentle pace. It doesn’t need to be sprinting, but the point is that we’re both getting exercise and having a little chat along the way, and being able to encourage one and other is a lovely part of it.
Once you’re out there doing exercise and the adrenaline and endorphins get going, you’ll never regret doing it – being healthy and looking after yourself is vital.
How did you stay motivated when needing to train on such a regular basis?
As an athlete competing, there were always going to be down days, especially when you’re injured. You wake up and you are exhausted, your body aches and hurts and the last thing you feel like doing is training. But once you drag yourself there and start warming up you always remember your end goal.
You want to get better every day as an athlete, the tiny little margins add up to you improving at competition and you want to get better and better. Whether it is nailing a certain corner or track or beating another competitor it is the improvements that you train so hard for every day.
For me it was always an internal thing, I wanted to get better and stronger, I would look at old training diaries and for example, see that I could lift weights 20kg heavier than the previous year. Achievement for me essentially came down to data, writing down my personal goals and keeping track of how I progressed as a person and an athlete.
How do you stay healthy?
Before and during my pregnancy I did yoga daily and I got massively into it. As I was an athlete a lot of my body is a bit broken and yoga really helped me, I stuck to the class as best I could but of course we had to accommodate for my massive belly in some exercises! But it was really amazing, and I think it gets you into a really good head space.
I walk a lot and try not to take the car when I can avoid it, and I have also taken to jogging with the buggy as I found one I could jog with. One early morning when feeding the baby I found a group on Instagram called Yummy Mummies, which is a fitness class you can bring your baby to. It’s been really lovely getting back into shape.
Would you recommend skeleton racing to a newcomer to the sport?
Of course! I know skeleton looks like a crazy sport but honestly it is no more dangerous than cycling down a really steep hill where there could be a car or a pot hole or anything that can make you fall off! I have hurt myself more by falling off a bike and not being able to get my feet out than I have skeleton racing. It is a great sport. It’s adrenaline, it’s excitement, you’re in the mountains and you have blue sky and snow all the time – why wouldn’t you want to do it?
Amy Williams was speaking on behalf of SAS – the leader in analytics software and services. SAS is the Official Analytics Partner of British Rowing. Further information at sas.com
