Rebecca Adlington

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons, the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.

Presenter0:34

My castaway this week is Rebecca Adlington, Britain's most successful female swimmer. A multiple medal winner and record breaker she's packed a lot in at a young age. First grabbing the nation's attention by winning two gold at the Beijing Olympics and breaking a world record into the bargain.

Presenter0:51

When she got back home she was granted the freedom of Mansfield, and the Mayor gave her a pair of golden shoes. The Queen opted for the more conventional approach, bestowing an OBE.

Presenter1:01

She went on to win two more medals at the London twenty twelve Olympics, and when all the cheering and flag waving had died down and the games were over, she announced her retirement. She's hardly been a slouch since, appearing regularly on T V, getting married, and in recent months getting ready for the birth of her first child.

Presenter1:20

She's only twenty six. One of three sisters, family life was dominated by early morning training sessions at the local pool, and it wasn't long before little Becky was out of the shallow end and heading for the fast lane. The Sherwood Baths is now renamed the Rebecca Adlington Swimming Centre. She says

Presenter1:38

There is Swimmer Becky and there is me.

Presenter1:42

In the pool, don't get in my way. I have a job to do. I am not here to entertain you. I am here to do what I need to get done. So, welcome, Rebecca Adlington. You are two years now into your retirement, and I'm guessing that Team GB are currently, they must be in training already for the Rio Olympics. Are you jealous or delighted that you're not part of it? Delighted.

Rebecca Adlington2:01

You're not far to

Rebecca Adlington2:03

Yeah, I loved my time and I loved my career and I absolutely loved swimming but definitely it was time for the new generation to come through and I always is even from being tiny tiny weenie and knowing that I wanted to be a swimmer, always said I wanted to finish my career on a high and then start the new chapter of my life as well. So I'm enjoying doing some of the mentoring and kind of seeing the team grow now and develop ahead of Rio.

Presenter2:03

It's hidden.

Presenter2:31

What are the things about the experience of becoming of being an Olympic athlete in training, of getting there and gaining success? What are the nuggets that you're passing on to these youngsters?

Rebecca Adlington2:43

You've got to be tough. You've got to be really resilient. You've got to fight for it. It's not going to be given to you. You're not just going to get handed that medal. You've got to fight for every little thing that you want to achieve.

Presenter2:45

Yeah.

Presenter2:54

Of all the accolades that I mentioned in your introduction today, and they're many and various, which is the one that you personally you know, it means the most to you personally?

Rebecca Adlington3:03

Getting the world records in Beijing, it was as old as myself when I broke it. It was 19 years old. It was the longest world record in the history books. It was kind of the one that was seen as this one's going to be going on for 20, 30 years. So to break it at kind of 19, I was just like, oh my god, I'd never thought that a girl from Mansfield, just me, somebody that just loved to get in the pool and swim, would ever be able to break such a record. And it was just incredible to have my mum and dad there as well.

Presenter3:31

Tell me about your first piece of music then, Rebecca, that we're going to hear this morning. What what's this one and why have you chosen it?

Rebecca Adlington3:36

I've chosen Saturday Night at the Movies by The Drifters as it was just for me. This is a song that just makes me so happy and it just reminds me of family life. It was like we loved this sort of music growing up in our household. I'm the youngest, obviously, we've got two older sisters. We always kind of had music on when we were cooking or kind of even if we were just in the kitchen, and we often have big family events. And this is just a song that just reminds me of that and just makes me so happy every time I listen to it. And I've never got sick of it. Let's hear it.

Speaker 34:07

Everybody in the neighborhood is dressing up to be there too And we're gonna have a ball just like we always

Speaker 34:22

Saturday night and the moon is

Speaker 34:25

Guess what picture you see?

Speaker 34:29

When you're giving your bail ash row in the baggage

Presenter4:34

The Drifters and Saturday Night at the Movies, and sure enough, Rebecca, you were singing along there and enjoying that. So part of this very close family, you were born in nineteen eighty nine. The youngest, as you say, of three sisters. I think that's quite an interesting place in the Pecking Order to be.

Speaker 34:38

I'm enjoying that.

Presenter4:50

How was it for you?

Rebecca Adlington4:51

It's one of those things that you can tell now that we're a little bit older, the different characteristic that we've all had from me being the youngest. I'm a little bit probably more laid back and a bit more carefree than my sisters. And my sisters are just, they're so protective. Whereas I think as the baby, you don't feel as protective. And you're just kind of like, oh, yeah, they're my big sisters. They'll get through anything. And you kind of just have that attitude. And it just makes you a bit more laid back. But they hated me beating them. And so I mean, we all swam. It was our family thing that we used to go to club together and we used to go at weekends and they just did not like me beating them. Are your parents sporty? Not at all. No, not at all. I'm so.

Presenter5:27

I'm so surprised.

Rebecca Adlington5:28

Yeah, no, they li like watching sport, but they're not sporty people at all. We're a dead small town in Mansfield, but we're very lucky that in this tiny place, we haven't even got a hotel yet. We've got two swimming pools.

Presenter5:39

The swimming pool was just round the corner. It was just a walk from your house.

Rebecca Adlington5:41

What from your house?

Presenter5:43

Was that why they took their three girls there?'Cause it was something to do and it was close by.

Rebecca Adlington5:46

Something that you can do together as a family summon. I think other sports, like you can't play rugby with them from three, can you? Or other sports, I think it's quite difficult for them to be active. And even when like my mum tried me with ballet and all that, but they couldn't get involved in that. And yet on the weekends, mum and dad could get in the pool with us and we could actually do it as a family and go together. I don't look back on my career and remember all the hard times. I remember times having splashing about pretending to be a mermaid with my mum and dad.

Presenter6:13

Do you remember getting rid of your armbands and doing doggy paddle? Was that a moment, or?

Rebecca Adlington6:19

I can remember being on holiday, and my mum says that was the most terrifying moment of her life that she was blowing up the armbands. And me being the baby, I think because you see your older sisters and they could fully swim, they were fine in the pool. My mum was blowing up the armbands, that I just ran, not having any lessons, I just ran into the pool. Oh my goodness. And my uncle, who can't swim, he's terrified of water, jumped in the pool after me. And I ended up saving him at three. I was just like, I could float. I was like, I could just do it. And then after that, my mum was like, right, she's going into lessons. I just had no fear. So.

Speaker 36:30

Yeah.

Presenter6:30

Yeah.

Speaker 36:30

Yeah.

Presenter6:37

Oh my goodness.

Speaker 36:38

Uh

Presenter6:38

Uh

Presenter6:46

You could just do it.

Rebecca Adlington6:52

Uh

Presenter6:52

Tell me about your next piece of music then, Rebecca. What are we going to hear?

Rebecca Adlington6:53

What are we going to hear? Spice Girls. This was just my era growing up. I just absolutely loved the Spice Girls.

Presenter6:59

Did it mean something to you, that message, the that I mean, you know, it's easy to deride it, the girl power thing, but as a little girl, did you look at it and think, yeah, I'm th I'm one of those?

Rebecca Adlington7:08

I loved the fact that you could be. Spice Girls wasn't just one of those girl bands where, right, they dressed them all the same. I loved the fact that at school I was either always sporty or baby because I had blonde hair. And all of us used to be like, well, who are you? And they stood for something. They were powerful and they were like, yeah, all about girl power. And each had their personality. So we loved that at school, just like dancing around in the playground. And especially with three girls in the house, we just used to dance around our bedroom to Spice Girls all the time.

Presenter7:13

Sure.

Speaker 37:38

Don't tell me what you want, what you really, really want. I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want. Don't tell me what you want, what you really, really want. I wanna have

Speaker 37:47

I wanna really really really wanna zig is like ah If you want my future

Speaker 37:52

Forget my past.

Speaker 37:55

If you wanna get with me, better make it fast. Now don't go wasting my precious time. Get your act together, we could be just fine.

Presenter8:08

Spice Girls and Wannabee and Rebecca Adlington was rapping there.

Presenter8:12

She knew every word, faultless. Um every young athlete, Rebecca, needs dedicated it's usually family support when you're very young. Tell me about your mum and dad. I'm sure that you will tell me that they were instrumental, but you know, in real terms, what sort of support did you get from them once you started to really take swimming seriously?

Rebecca Adlington8:31

They're the ones that they have to become everything. Literally, my mum was like my taxi driver. They were my funding. My mum had to be my nutritionist, my physio. They were the ones that kind of had to become a doctor almost to diagnose you if you kind of were run down or if you had a shoulder injury or anything like that. You kind of turned to your parents. And the one thing that I am so grateful for my parents, it's very hard. I think it was harder for my dad at 12 when I met my coach, Bill Furness.

Rebecca Adlington8:58

And I went to Nottingham and was doing all my training. That they totally had to put their trust in this guy. Bill was like my second dad. And that's kind of, I'm not being disrespectful to my dad at all when I say that. It's just, I spent 24-7 with Bill, and it was just, he just knew me. He knows my body language. He knows when I'm tired. And my parents were just brilliant about that. They just put their trust in him and said,

Presenter9:04

Then this guy

Rebecca Adlington9:24

You're the coach, you've got to take her to where you want to take her.

Presenter9:28

Is that really part of the alchemy of a champion, to have a coach that is absolutely empathetic and is really as close as anybody in your family is to you?

Rebecca Adlington9:37

Yeah, your coach is the person that will motivate you, will help you, will literally has to be everything. And I think me and Bill just had this instant respect for each other.

Presenter9:48

What about the internal family dynamics? I mean, you say, you know, you were just Becky, you were the littlest sister, but the truth is, if your mum is r you know, going up and down the dual carriageway or the motorway with you, well, she's not at home helping one of your sisters with their homework, or she's not able to see them when, you know, it's it's parents' evening'cause you have to be somewhere else. It must truthfully affect family dynamics in a significant way.

Rebecca Adlington10:09

It was so hard, it was growing up, and it was just I kind of didn't really realize at the time. We were traveling to Lincoln every day, which was over an hour, and then my mum one day

Presenter10:19

Is that an hour there, an hour back? Yeah.

Rebecca Adlington10:20

Yeah, and twice a day.

Rebecca Adlington10:23

And then obviously she was going to work and I was about twelve at the time and my mum pulled the car over and I was like, Mum, what's going on? and she almost had like a fit and I just this twelve year old girl was like, Mum, I didn't know what to do. I'm

Presenter10:35

Nervous exhaustion, was it?

Rebecca Adlington10:37

She was just so exhausted from all the travelling, from trying to run the family home, trying to be there for my sisters, trying to have a job. And it was after that that she said, Look, I can't do this. We've got to move to Nottingham So even though it was still forty minutes away, it was better than over an hour away.

Presenter10:52

Yeah.

Rebecca Adlington10:53

Not moving the family. Yeah, yeah. Moving the training and then she decided with the family as well to give up her job. That was a big thing for the family to to give up.

Presenter11:03

These are huge fundamental uh changes in a family for one person's pursuit and one person's dream. Was it your aim at that point that you were going to be a world champion, an Olympic medallist? Was that why all these sacrifices and changes were being made?

Rebecca Adlington11:18

My mum just knew it is the thing that I loved. Was there any?

Presenter11:21

Um, financial support. I mean, obviously, you know, petrol money. You've got to buy things to eat when you're out and about that are more expensive. You've got to eat the right thing. You know, there's all sorts of little incremental expenses, even with something like swimming. Did you get any financial support from outside?

Rebecca Adlington11:34

When I got to about thirteen, fourteen, I managed to get on like a development programme within British Swimming. So you get about three thousand pounds a year, which will cover all your competition fees, your costume, because like a racing suit costs around two hundred pound. To enter competitions, you've got your hotels, like you say, you travel. So that went kinda straight to my mum and dad, that money. It wasn't until really the Olympic Games that I was able to then fund myself at nineteen and actually

Presenter11:44

John V

Rebecca Adlington12:02

have a bit of financial support which my family were like, oh thank God.

Presenter12:06

More in a second, Rebecca. Let's fit in some more music. Tell me about your third one. What are we going to hear?

Rebecca Adlington12:10

I just love Disney movies, all Disney movies. I'm such a Disney girl. And for mine and Harry's um wedding after our honeymoon, my present to him was Disneyland for a week as well. So even though I'm twenty six, we're still like such big kids at heart. So I had to have a Disney song in there.

Rebecca Adlington12:27

Yeah.

Presenter12:27

Here it is.

Speaker 412:28

Yeah.

Rebecca Adlington12:28

I

Speaker 412:29

Can show you the world.

Speaker 412:32

Shining, shimmering, splendid, Tell me Princess, now when did you last let your heart decide?

Speaker 412:44

I can open your eyes.

Speaker 412:47

Take you wonder by wonder Oversideways and under On a magic carpet ride

Presenter13:00

From Disney's Aladdin that was Brad Kane and Leah Salonga singing A Whole New World for our self confessed Disney fanatic Rebecca Adlington. And the solitary aspect of training, Rebecca, you know, of hour upon hour upon hour in the pool.

Presenter13:15

As a teenager, you know that those are crucial years. How do you think it has shaped your personality into the young woman you are?

Rebecca Adlington13:21

It's not like most people that just go swimming on their own and swim up and down and they kind of have no interaction with other people.

Presenter13:27

Okay.

Rebecca Adlington13:28

Whereas we have a team, we have obviously a coach, we have a sports scientist as well. So there's loads of people around you, but especially as a distance from me, you're always the first in the pool, you're always the last out the pool. It's a lot, a lot of hours. Just face down, you don't get much rest. That's kind of what it is. But

Presenter13:38

Yeah.

Presenter13:44

Uh Can you actually ever truly be friends with somebody who you're training with and who's part of the team but who could win the title or the medal ahead of you? Properly friends?

Rebecca Adlington13:54

Yeah. My best friend. She was my bridesmaid at my wedding. We were rivals. We were everything. Sh um, when in Beijing for the four hundred free, I got the gold. Joe got the bronze.

Rebecca Adlington14:06

And we have just been so close our whole entire career.

Presenter14:08

Now here's the thing, I'm going to say the unsayable. Do you think if the medal positions had been the other way round she would still have been

Presenter14:14

Your bridesmaid.

Rebecca Adlington14:16

Yeah, I'm her bridesmaid. Are you? If I wasn't on that podium, I'd want her on that podium.

Presenter14:18

Yeah.

Presenter14:23

What do you make of the idea that, you know, t to seek out Olympic glory and you seem to me to be a very well balanced, open-hearted young woman, but there has to be something about that single-minded pursuit of glory that is inevitably not just sort of egotistical, but phenomenally selfish.

Rebecca Adlington14:43

It's a very selfish thing to do. All these people giving up stuff just for you. I'm not be becoming a doctor to save people's lives. I'm not even doing something that's benefiting other people. I'm doing something that's so self-centered and that's for me and my benefit as well. And it is how do you

Presenter14:59

How do you reconcile that then?

Rebecca Adlington15:01

It's just one of those things that you just have to. You're in this little bubble, and I think growing up when you're doing all the training as well, it's just kind of like you recognize that. I think for me, from a young age, I got to know my body and I knew what I had to do to succeed. I don't think you have to be arrogant about it. I think there is some people that have got a bit of an ego and arrogance to them, and that's why people don't like them naturally, they come across bad. Whereas I don't think you have to be like that.

Rebecca Adlington15:27

I was a very different person in the pool to what I was out of the pool.

Presenter15:31

Yes, I mean I th the quote that I introduced you with today, I thought, oh she's as hard as it.

Rebecca Adlington15:35

Eh?

Rebecca Adlington15:36

But you'd have to be. Yeah, yeah, you have to be. Had to have that attitude. But out of the pool, I'd do anything for anyone, and I'm totally, totally different. It was just in the pool.

Presenter15:37

Yeah.

Presenter15:44

But that little sliver of ice has to be there to make a champion, you think?

Rebecca Adlington15:48

Yeah. You have to have this animal instinct and that's what it is even with me and Joe, even being best friends. As soon as we dived in that pool, we weren't friends anymore. But at the same time, we still supported each other and we still loved each other and wanted the best for each other.

Presenter15:48

Yeah.

Presenter16:01

Let's hear your next piece then, Rebecca Adlington. Tell me about your fourth song. What are we going to hear now?

Rebecca Adlington16:06

Hungry Eyes. I absolutely love dirty dancing. It is my favourite.

Presenter16:11

We're talking about the film here, just to be clear.

Rebecca Adlington16:12

Yes, definitely the film. But I absolutely love Dirty Dance and it was the thing that I've seen must have been over 200 times. I know the whole world to I know. I love to

Presenter16:23

For real, you've seen it two hundred times.

Rebecca Adlington16:25

At least, yeah.

Speaker 316:30

And one more gift here as I kill the skies of cast

Speaker 316:40

Feel the magic contributing you

Speaker 316:48

I wanna hold you so here

Speaker 316:52

Yeah

Presenter16:55

That was Eric Carmen's Saying Hungry Eyes from Dirty Dancing, a movie that you assure me, Rebecca Adlington, you've watched at least 200 times. Let's talk about 2005. It seems like uh it was an important year in your life. You were gearing up for your GCSEs and for big international competitions, and your older sister Laura became really seriously ill with encephalitis. Just tell me what you remember about that time.

Rebecca Adlington17:18

It was a really just tough couple of months. I had had glandular fever, so I was taking a bit of time, kind of a backstep from swimming, just because my body couldn't do it anymore. I was just so exhausted. And then within that time, my sister had just a really bad cold. She just had a really bad flu. She went up to her room, and my mum, she was there for like three days, just in bed. My mum was like, this doesn't seem right. Her temperature's all over the place. So she phoned the doctor to come out to the house. And the doctor came out to the house and said, she needs to go into hospital. We need to do some tests. So we just thought, oh, she's probably just got a really bad virus. We didn't think anything of it.

Presenter17:54

Didn't think

Rebecca Adlington17:56

She went into hospital.

Rebecca Adlington17:58

She turned around to my mum and she just said, Mum, call the nurse. And my mum was like, oh, why? What do you need? She was like, no, mum, call the nurse. And then her eyes rolled back in her head. She had a massive fit. My mum just was calling, screaming and shouting for the nurse to come. She was in intensive care, hooked up to all the tubes, everything like that for about three, four days. The specialists kind of came in and they kind of said, look, she's got encephalitis, which is a brain virus. It's where the brain swells. And they're kind of like, well, it's lucky that she's young. She's healthy. Hopefully she'll pull through. We've basically got to see what happens when she wakes up.

Presenter18:07

Mm-hmm.

Rebecca Adlington18:37

And at first she woke up and I can remember seeing her for the first time and I went into the wood. She was still on oxygen, she still had tubes in her mouth, and she just tapped her chest to say, I love you and she just kind of was trying to mouth to us all that she loves us. We knew that she was going to be okay just from that point.

Presenter18:53

for this sort of entirely unpredicted.

Presenter18:58

Bomb to explode in the middle of the family. How did it affect you all? Aside from, of course, Laura's recovery.

Rebecca Adlington19:03

Totally changed everything. We just put all the pettiness aside. Normally at fifty well, I was fifteen, I'm normally yelling at your mum and I hate you, I'm not doing this. And you normally have them teenage years. None of that happened. We just thought,

Rebecca Adlington19:17

God, life is so short, and we've just got to live each day, and we've just got to do everything we can to support one another here. And it just totally changed in that way. And even after my parents sat me down and said, Look, you need to get better as well. I need to look after your sister. She's a priority. She needs to get better. Take a year off school. So I took a year off. Did you? Yeah.

Presenter19:39

Yeah. And how much time did you take off training?

Rebecca Adlington19:42

I only took about kind of two months. Swimming actually became a thing that my parents wanted to keep something normal. I was at the back of the lane just plodding up and down. I wasn't going fast at all, but the hospital was only ten minutes' walk away from the pool.

Presenter19:58

Let's have some more music, Rebecca. What are we going to hear now? We're on your fifth of the morning.

Rebecca Adlington20:01

The Shine by Shannon Noll. I'd never heard this song before. And obviously for us, we were out in Beijing at the Olympics, where we weren't watching the coverage back here, so we couldn't see anything. And then

Presenter20:11

So we couldn't.

Rebecca Adlington20:13

We came back home and I was watching all these highlights, I was seeing it all on T V. My parents were showing everything and this song was just the common theme. It just reminds me of winning two gold medals.

Speaker 320:36

All the world stopped to watch you shine.

Speaker 320:51

Now senor here

Presenter20:54

Shannon Noll and Shine, and indeed Shine you did. Let's take a moment just to enjoy all of that then. Beijing two thousand eight. Two stunning victories, two goals. You'll be in the history books forever for doing that. Let's just talk about the maybe even the day before.

Presenter21:09

The lead up, wh what were you thinking?

Rebecca Adlington21:12

I had actually had a chest infection the week before, and I was on antibiotics. I was trying to get better. My target for the 400 was just to make the final. So I came out of the heat and made the final. I was like, oh my God, I've achieved my dream. I'm going to swim in an Olympic final, my first Olympic Games, and I've made a final. I thought it can't get better than this. I dived in and I thought, I feel rubbish. I was like, what's going on? I felt absolutely horrendous. I just felt sluggish. I was coming last until like the last hundred meters. I was like seventh or eighth. I finally got into my stride and then I turned with just 50 meters to go.

Presenter21:40

Yeah.

Speaker 321:41

Uh

Rebecca Adlington21:53

And I just kind of moved up and I thought, oh gosh, me and Joe, we were like pushing each other. I thought, hold on, we could get a medal here. I thought the American girl was a bit too far ahead, but she just kind of died off a little bit, and I just came through. And I just, I still watch it back, and I still get so nervous because I still don't know how I won it. It's so close, it's unbelievable.

Presenter22:14

And you look totally astonished that you've won the gold.

Rebecca Adlington22:16

I am. I just I couldn't believe it. I just didn't think that was ever possible. And then seeing that and sharing that moment with your best friend as well is just something incredible.

Presenter22:27

And then you did it again, and you went on to essentially what was your event, the eight hundred meters freestyle, and you you break a world record to boot. Wh when you look back on that now, not in the moment of doing it, but looking back on it now with a bit more maturity,

Rebecca Adlington22:29

Thank you.

Presenter22:42

A bit of distance. What do you think now about it?

Rebecca Adlington22:46

when I touched the wall, the first thing that you see is WR. So the first thing I realized was I've got a world record. And then you realize the the time that you broke that world record. And I don't know how the cameraman did it.

Rebecca Adlington23:00

In 17,000 people, the cameraman found my mum and dad, and they flashed up on this big screen. My dad was in tears. It was just.

Rebecca Adlington23:10

incre I couldn't have pieced it together more perfectly. That was just the best moment of my whole entire life. It just having that the world record, the gold and my parents was just unbelievable.

Presenter23:22

And here back at home you were of course you were to the headline writers the golden girl and you were on the front of all the papers and you were at the top of all the news bulletins and you've done this phenomenal thing that you've been building towards for so many years and then you come home and you still have to buy your knickers in Martin Spencer's and you still have to go and get a pint of milk and you know you have to live your life and yet suddenly you're a nationally recognized figure.

Rebecca Adlington23:26

The golden girl and you run the f

Rebecca Adlington23:38

Present.

Presenter23:46

How did you cope? Did you stay indoors? Did you go out and sign forty-five autographs every day? I mean, what did you do?

Rebecca Adlington23:51

I don't think I did cope. Do you know what I mean? I don't think you can ever can. I was from such a small town anyway. It was a strange situation for myself going, Why do you want to talk to me? I'm just a swimmer. I literally eat, sleep, swim, eat, sleep, swim. It's very, very boring. I just didn't understand it. It was just bizarre.

Presenter24:12

Speaking of Yeah.

Rebecca Adlington24:12

Yeah.

Presenter24:12

Bizarre.

Rebecca Adlington24:12

Yeah.

Presenter24:12

What were the golden shoes about?

Rebecca Adlington24:13

Was that Ninja?

Presenter24:14

Ninja

Rebecca Adlington24:15

When you're in a costume, no makeup and wet hair, 90% of your life, you like to dress up now and again. And shoes were my thing that even from a little girl, I used to walk around my mum's heels. And just that was the thing that just made me feel really girly and I loved. And the mayor said, Well, if you come back with a gold, I'll get you a pair of gold Jimmy shoes. I was like, Oh, okay. And then he held up his end of the bargain and got me the gold shoes, and I've still got them now.

Presenter24:38

Tell me about this next piece of music then, your sixth disc.

Rebecca Adlington24:40

Dog days are over, Florence and the Machine. This was for me a real big turning point kind of in my career. I'd been to Beijing, I had a really tough 2009. And then it was kind of like one of those things that it was in 2011. This song was paid at the World Championship trials, and I qualified. I just felt like I was now a woman. I wasn't this little girl that kind of had been overwhelmed by everything from Beijing. I wasn't this 19-year-old vulnerable person anymore. I felt really strong. I felt confident. And I managed on going to the World Championships and come away with a gold medal, which for me, a year ahead of the London Olympics, was just amazing. But this was the song that I just constantly listened to. Dog days are gone, and I was finally able to put that to bed and move forward in my career.

Speaker 325:25

She hid around corners and she hid under bed.

Speaker 325:31

So killed with kisses And for our mess we flew

Speaker 325:38

With every bubble she signed with a dream

Speaker 325:44

And washed it away down the kitchen steam.

Speaker 325:51

The dark days are over The dark days are over

Presenter25:56

Dog days are over, Florence and Machine. So it was two bronzes for you at London twenty twelve, Rebecca Adlington. Um interesting you swam even faster in your four hundred metres than you had when you had won the gold. But I'm wondering, how really does third place feel to an Olympic champion who who knows what it's like to win gold?

Rebecca Adlington26:15

Both races are very different. For the 400s, when I caught the bronze, I was so happy with that. I swam a faster time. That's what every athlete wants to do.

Presenter26:22

Hmm.

Rebecca Adlington26:25

The eight hundred was so different because I s swam so much slower than my best. It wasn't the position that bothered me, it was the time. And that's something that's very hard for me as an athlete, which is why I just got so emotional as well, because I felt like I'd let people down. I felt like I'd let my coach down.

Presenter26:41

So how did you resolve that feeling of having let people down?

Rebecca Adlington26:45

You can't. One of the first things I said to Bill, my coach, was, I'm so sorry. And he went, Don't ever say that to me again. He was like, I am so proud of you. I had been, I had my podium presentation. I walked back through and they managed to bring my family down. And I was just crying my eyes out. I was like, I just, that was awful. I just, I'm so sorry. And I just, and they said exactly the same. And I'm so proud of that bronze medal now because I did everything I could. So why?

Presenter27:12

Nurse, if you decided to take it easy, did you sign up to go into I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here in the middle of the Australian jungle? That seems like the worst.

Rebecca Adlington27:16

In the middle of the Australian

Presenter27:20

Punishment possible in retirement.

Rebecca Adlington27:22

It was one of those things that I got asked to do it and I just thought

Presenter27:25

Oh what?

Rebecca Adlington27:25

It'd be awful. I hate bugs. I'm a hotel girl. Did they weave a lot of money?

Presenter27:28

Money in your face. Was that one of the

Rebecca Adlington27:30

It wasn't anything actually to do with the money, even though obviously that's a bonus, especially for me. It was a case of that I could fund myself, and especially now I'm retired. But.

Presenter27:38

Yeah

Rebecca Adlington27:39

My husband, it was actually him that changed my mind more than anyone else thinks Harry went.

Rebecca Adlington27:44

Babe.

Rebecca Adlington27:45

You're twenty three. Go live your life. And I was like, oh, yeah. We both wanted to start a family as well. So we went, This is your opportunity. You're never going to do something like this again. So go do it. Go have a laugh.

Presenter27:57

It didn't look like it entirely was a laugh, so I'm particularly thinking of now it was an edited section where you seemed to be really very upset about, you know, your body image and you d you weren't happy with your weight and what's your version of events? Is that really what happens?

Rebecca Adlington28:11

It was a shame how they edited that because it was such a positive piece. And it actually came across as that me and Amy were doing this battle, which we weren't at all. Amy agreed. Amy and for me, what I found fascinating because I'm I've not been

Presenter28:24

And this is a a model called Amy Willison.

Rebecca Adlington28:26

Yeah, yeah. And someone who is absolutely gorgeous, and all the girls in there. And I think for me, I've not got celebrity friends. I don't hang out with famous people. I'm not showbiz at all. I'd never really talked to somebody that had been through similar things, like the abuse on Twitter, getting harsh, like negative feedback about the way you look. I'd never spoken to anyone about that before. So actually, what was fascinating for me is hearing how everyone in there was getting this. It was actually a massive therapy session for me.

Presenter28:55

Let's have some music, Rebecca. Um, you're seventh.

Rebecca Adlington28:57

Is one day elbow and this is just so special to me for so many different reasons. But this was the song of the London Olympics. Elbow played at the closing ceremony. I really took a step back and thought, this is just amazing. Not many people get to experience a Home Olympics, let alone be in my career, have a chance to compete at a Home Olympics. To then be my last Olympic Games and to be with all my best friends standing there at this closing ceremony was just one of those breathtaking moments where it just seems like everyone in the world just slows down and you're just taking everything in. And it was it's such a beautiful song anyway. My sister then went on to choose this as her first dance at her wedding. So again, it's a really nice special thing that it just reminds me of my sister's wedding now as well.

Speaker 329:44

Drinking in the morning sun

Speaker 329:50

Blinking in the morning so

Speaker 329:56

Shaking off your head, whoa!

Speaker 330:01

I have you like a lot of gone

Speaker 330:08

What made me behave that way?

Presenter30:13

Uh

Presenter30:15

Elbow and one day. What about the idea? You come from this happy, very close-knit family. The idea of what we expect from our children and the sort of lives we want for them. I I wonder if you think that you might want to foster a little champion. If you think that this little girl, you know, you'll take her you'll take her along to the swimming baths and you'll just just see her technique. Do you like the idea of pursuing that with your own child, or do you want to run a million miles in the opposite direction?

Rebecca Adlington30:35

Next.

Rebecca Adlington30:41

That's a lot of sacrifice as a family, not just for them, but at the same time, both me and my husband come from the world of swimming and we've had such a brilliant life. We've met the best people that we're so grateful of our careers that we would love her to have that. But most of the time, it ends up that you do something completely different to your parents. I'd love her to go into the world of sport because I do think sport gives you so much more than just medals and everything else, that I'd love her to have that.

Presenter31:11

And post retirement, what about your life in the world of sport? You started doing a bit of commentating and you you know, you have an aptitude for that. Is that where you think your future lies? Do you imagine that you you'd like to be in T V and radio studios doing that?

Rebecca Adlington31:23

Hopefully, yeah, I'd love to. I feel like I've just moved departments. I'm still so involved in swimming from, like I said earlier, mentoring some of the younger guys, the commentary. I run my own learned swim program that I still feel like I'm so involved in the sport. I still wake up every single day and I'm doing something that I love. Not many people have that.

Presenter31:43

So tell me about the island then. I'm imagining probably more than any other castaway I've spoken to, you'll be the one who'll be capable of of, you know, rescuing yourself by swimming to the next island. But let's put that to one side. Life alone. I mean, you're a highly sociable, outgoing person. How how would you cope, do you think?

Rebecca Adlington31:58

interacting with people would be my downfall is the fact that I love just chatting to whoever and I'm I am very sociable, so that will be very difficult. But I feel like I could deal with the boredom side of things.

Presenter32:09

Let's hear your final track, Rebecca.

Rebecca Adlington32:11

When we got married last summer.

Rebecca Adlington32:13

We tried to think of a song I could walk down the aisle to, and I heard this Ed Sheeran song that was just an album song. And we thought we had found this hidden gem, this little secret that was just our little baby. That I thought those words are just perfect. And then, after the wedding, the song became huge, and now it's so overplayed. And it was just obviously one of the best days of my life, marrying my best friend, the love of my life. So it brings back amazing memories.

Speaker 332:40

When your legs don't work like they used to before

Speaker 332:44

Uh

Speaker 332:46

And I can't sweep you off of your feet

Speaker 332:51

Mm.

Speaker 332:52

Will your mouth still remember the taste of my love?

Speaker 332:58

Will your eyes still smile from your cheek?

Speaker 333:03

Darling I

Speaker 333:04

We'll be loving you

Speaker 333:08

Till seventy

Presenter33:12

Ed Sheeran and Thinking Out Loud. Right, Rebecca, I'm going to give you the books. Now, you get to take to this island, all on your own, the complete works of Shakespeare, and a copy of the Bible, and then one other book that's your choice. What's yours going to be?

Rebecca Adlington33:25

Well, the survival guide would be quite good, but I love famous five books. Absolutely loves them.

Presenter33:30

Yeah.

Presenter33:32

There will be a collected works of Famous Five. I'm sure it's not all of them, but the the biggest one we've got we will find and give it to you for the other line. Um your lifestake a luxury, something that will make life just a little bit more bearable.

Rebecca Adlington33:38

Definitely.

Rebecca Adlington33:43

Pillow. Pillow would definitely be my thing.

Presenter33:46

It's yours. And if you had to save just one of these tracks, which one would it be?

Rebecca Adlington33:50

It was Be the Ed Sheeran thinking out loud, even though it's so overplayed now, it's just the thing that reminds me of Harry and just is so emotional and just, yeah, the happiest day of my life.

Presenter34:00

Rebecca Adlington, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Rebecca Adlington34:04

Q.

Presenter34:45

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio4.