ADLINGTON Sarah

General
DEALING WITH DISAPPOINTMENT
After the postponement of the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo due to the COVID-19 pandemic, she says she began reflecting on the disappointments during her career. She was unable to qualify for the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games, and in 2018 missed out on a world championship bronze medal in golden score. "With what's happened with me having disappointments throughout my career, I started doubting everything. During lockdown, I'd have low days and I'd go over my career and think back to times I'd missed out. I was looking back thinking, 'If only', about different results. But then I realised that it doesn't all come down to medals - it's about the journey. I had dark days but I'm lucky that I have good people around me who I can pick up the phone to and help get me out of that. What's been good about this period though is there's nothing dragging me down because you're away from all of that outside noise. If everything works out well and I end up on that plane to Tokyo, what more can you ask?" (thenational.scot, 08 Dec 2020; thenational.scot, 25 Jun 2015)

TRAINING IN SCOTLAND
In 2018 she said she had lost her funding after a change in British Judo policy, which meant only athletes who relocated to the national training centre in Walsall, England, would be eligible for funding. She had joined the Judo Scotland set-up in 2005 after moving from Shropshire, England, and chose to remain at her base in Edinburgh, Scotland, ahead of the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. "Japan is the home of judo so it would be amazing to be there. For any judo player, to have the opportunity to fight in an Olympic Games there is too good to pass up. But my life is in Edinburgh and I just didn't want to move away from that. My coach is here, I'm doing a degree here and everything I know is in Edinburgh. The Sport Scotland Institute of Sport help a little bit but I just need to get on with it - I have no other option." (heraldscotland.com, 10 Feb 2018; shropshirestar.com, 29 May 2014; teamscotland.scot, 11 Feb 2014; championsinscotland.com, 01 Jan 2021)

LIFE AFTER JUDO
She says that throughout the COVID-19 lockdown she had time to consider life outside elite-level sport. "I'm 34 and so by now, there's expectations to have your own house and as a woman, there's certain expectations around that too with things like children, so I'm so conflicted by everything. I'm lucky I've got people around me who I can talk all of this through with because that's been one of the most difficult parts of this, there's been so much time to think." (thenational.scot, 08 Dec 2020)