Ending the year

The 31st December, every year, provides a time for us to look back on the year now behind us and remember those times that have made us laugh, cry, shout and scream. For me, this year has felt like a long and tough one and I'm not overly sad about leaving it behind. But when I look back, it has been an incredibly successful one, that I have had some amazing moments in. 

I haven't had chance to do a long awaited blog post, or anything particularly special to mark the end of the year but don't worry, one will be with you in the New Year! So for now, here is a link to a short video, packed with my highlights of 2014.....

http://slide.ly/view/51eb934feea63f73816838281613bcf1?utm_source=Fb_ORG_Share

Sporting celebrations

At the end of what seemed to be a very long week, I travelled up to Glasgow on Sunday to the BBC Sports Personality of the Year awards show, which was held at the SSE Hydro arena and I got to have the full 'red carpet' experience in my fabulous Ted Baker dress .

I actually missed 70% of the awards ceremony itself, due to me being on a panel for BBC Radio 5 live in another room with several other panellists, but I did manage to follow what was happening through their coverage.

It's a rare occasion that athletes get the chance to all meet up and let their hair down, but Sports Personality of the Year allows that to happen and with the GB Paralympic Team laying down some awesome performances this year, it was fantastic to finally have a strong number of disabled athletes invited, to celebrate their phenomenal achievements. Here's to even more next year and we'll have a good representation among the nominees.

A different sort of day

I suppose today wasn't really typical of my usual days, which are currently mostly filled by training, university, study, training, study and more training, interspersed with eating and sleeping!

My morning started with an early train into London for a meeting with the British Athletics Commission, from there I went and met with representatives of the Silverfit Charity to sign one of their murals created by pupils of the Stephen Hawking School in Tower Hamlets along with the artist Richard Tait. I understand the mural will be auctioned in the Spring for the charity.

Then it was a trip to the Grand Connaught Rooms in Covent Garden for the Sports Journalists British Sports Awards.  There were no awards for me on this occasion but it was a great afternoon celebration of British sport and I did get to meet some truly amazing and inspirational people.  Plus of course, I got to wear a stunning dress from Ted Baker for the day!

With Maggie Alphonsi of the England WRU team

 

The legendary Michael Parkinson

Inspiring future sports stars

As part of my role as a panellist on the BBC Young Sports Personality, I was asked to do an interview for some students as part of the BBC School Report feature. 

My interview by School Reporters from Knightswood Secondary School in Glasgow has just been published on the BBC and you can read it via the link below.

Hannah's Interview for BBC School Report

I really enjoy talking with young people and sharing my story and experiences in the hope that they may be inspired to challenge themselves, or to keep working hard if they are already involved in sports, or other activities which take training, patience and dedication.

Inspiring Youth Sport

After a weekend of training, it was great to get out to the Hartford Church of England School in Northwich today as part of my role as Youth Sport Trust Ambassador.

The school won a photo competition that the Youth Sport Trust ran and I judged back as part of National School Sport Week back in June. There were thousands of schools taking part, who were invited to tweet images of the activities they were holding to celebrate the week. The photo that impressed me the most was one of the Hartford pupils taking part in capoeira, a Brazilian martial art which features elements of dance, acrobatics and music, I loved the brilliance and concentration of Reece doing capoeira.

I had a really fun day at Hartford, watching the pupils displays of various sports and talking to them about my experiences and the challenges I've faced to get to where I am today. It is great to see the school expanding on National School Sport Week by getting involved in such a wide range of sports activities and really continuing the legacy left by London 2012.

Pressures of being a Panellist

I was really honoured when the BBC invited me to be one of the judging panel to select their Young Sports Personality of the Year, and today I travelled to the BBC in Salford to take my seat among the other panellists. Past winners include Andy Murray, Tom Daley and Ellie Simmonds, so there was quite some pressure on us, and with so many talented young people in sport, how could we choose just ten for the shortlist ?

We were able to review each of the shortlist and came up with our final ten. I hope the public agree and approve of our choices! Have a look at the BBC Sport website for all the information www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/sports-personality/30208977

Honoured by an Award

The British Athletics Writers Association held their annual awards lunch in London today and as I am away at a training camp I wasn't able to attend, which is a real shame as I am delighted to have been awarded their Female Para Athlete of the Year award!

Fortunately Ian from our management company, 17 Management, was able to step in and collect the award for me.  I think I would have much rather been there eating a lovely lunch than pushing round the track in the cold wet weather....no glamour in an athletes life!

Helping to Make a Change

I had the chance to attend a "Get Set" event in Leeds today. It was fantastic to see the London 2012 legacy is living on through this programme run by young people who were inspired by the Olympics and have set out to make a change. The teams of young people, known as the Legacy Leaders, have pledged to encourage and motivate others to take part in sports and other physical activities. Have a look at their website for more information. www.makeachange.org.uk

I also got to meet the lovely Beth Tweddle while I was there too.

Supporting our Supporters

I had a wonderful time at the British Athletics Supporters Club event, held last night in Coventry. It was really great to be able to meet and thank some of the supporters of athletics. I know some travel far and wide to follow us and the support often helps lift us even more during competition.

Congratulations to Jo Pavey on being named BASC Athlete of the year. Definitely a most worthy winner.

Improvised acceptance speech

I attended the Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire Sports Awards tonight and I had to make my first acceptance speech! I hadn't prepared for that, but I am so happy to be a winner! Thank you CSW Sport for naming me your Higher / Further Education Sports Person of the year.

Accessibility in London

Following on from my appearance on the ITV London news where I issued my challenge to the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, I had a very positive meeting with TFL and Whizz-Kidz today about the future of London transport and its accessibility. What really surprised me to learn at the meeting was, much of London is actually already partly accessible! However, it's not advertised to people outside (or even inside, it seems) of London. This, along with many other points were brought up and discussed between us, and it's going to be an exciting future, hopefully resulting in more disabled people being independent, confident and free when travelling in and around London. I've offered my help in working alongside TFL to promote and educate, so watch this space..

A new venture to share with you

Really pleased to be able to release the official announcement today regarding a new business I have been working on recently. Going forward, whilst I'm still competing, I'm going to be involved on an advisory basis, but am planning ahead for my future now.


Press Release - 17 Management

Having had many unpleasant experiences working with agents and managers; I am pleased to announce my involvement in a new sports management company, 17 Sports Management Limited.

17 will focus on the management of both established and developing talent across all sports. There are some good management companies out there, but there are also many that are not so reputable. I want to be able to help fellow sports people avoid the pitfalls and traps that I fell in to. I want them to benefit from my unfortunate experiences.

17 is a collaboration between myself, my manager Ian Byers and Boo Matthews. Whilst I remain a competing athlete, Ian will lead the business and I will be involved in an advisory role. From my own experience of working with Ian, I know that he always puts the interest of his client first. He firmly believes in creating the right environment for the athlete, to allow them to compete to their maximum ability, whilst taking on the responsibility for all their off track activities to free them to focus on their training and competing. The team at 17 have extensive business experience and I know that our clients will benefit from this along with my understanding of competing at the highest level.

Whether you are an established sports person, dissatisfied with your current management, an up and coming talent looking for representation, or just wondering if you need professional management, whatever your sport, follow us on Twitter @_17management take a look at our website www.17management.com and get in touch.

My new friend Rory

I am SUPER excited this week to introduce the newest member of #TeamHannah - 'Rory' the hand cycle, courtesy of Invacare (there is no reasoning behind the name Rory, it just felt right!).

The new equipment is going to help me massively over winter with my distance training, building my endurance management and helping me manage more mileage as I wont be sat on my legs, which does cause me problems at times, so - no excuses now!!

I cant thank Invacare enough for supporting my cross training!

Sorry about the photo, my hall way just isn't big enough for all my equipment! I'll get some better photos when I take him out for a spin!

Learning the game

I feel so lucky that I am in the fortunate position to be able to get the chance to do some really cool things.

I am really very grateful to NFL UK who enabled me to have the chance to visit Wembley Stadium again at the weekend to see the Detroit Lions v Atlanta Falcons game. It was so exciting to finally see a close game and I'm starting to understand it more every time I watch. I was backing Atlanta Falcons all the way and they were so close to that win only for everything to change in the final 4 seconds! Still a great day out and I reckon there may be a space on the cheerleading team for an additional member....!

Continuing the Legacy

I was honoured to be invited to speak alongside Dame Tessa Jowell this evening at the offices of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer for Whizz-Kidz, highlighting the massive steps that London 2012 made for disability, but also the long journey it still has to go on.

Seeing stars

Well, I'm just catching up after a wonderful weekend shared with friends. It all started with a trip to London and my first ever visit to see a West End show, what an experience!

My weekend ended with another show, this time at Wembley Arena at the Radio 1 Teen Awards where I was very star struck seeing all the people on the red carpet. Ella Henderson, Rizzle Kicks and Labrinth are just three of those I managed to get 'selfies' with.   

Oh and you'll be pleased to hear I managed to get some training in during the weekend too! No rest until (after) Rio. 

Yorkshire Marathon

Pushed myself way out of my comfort zone for the Yorkshire Marathon today. Although I was racing in the corporate relay and so not doing the whole 26.2 miles, my 6 mile leg very quickly turned into a 10 mile roll through the fog, as I reached my Passover point and my team mate was nowhere to be found! There were a few hairy moments, concerning some slippy pushrims on a wet up hill, a fast downhill into a sharp bend (I of course, ended in a bush) and fog so thick I could barely see my front wheel. But it was all for a great cause and little by little, I'm working my way up to the longer distances and building my confidence in road racing. It'll still be a few years until you see me do the full thing though! Big congrats to Bret Crossley who won the wheelchair race, to my crazy relay team mate, Danny Mills who carried on after his 5 mile leg to complete the full marathon, and of course everyone who ran today. For whatever cause or reason, you raised thousands and it was incredible to sit on the finish line and see streams of people with so much passion and emotion. I love you, Yorkshire. (Fyi, My team mate was on the toilet).

Boris Wheelchair Challenge - Update

Many of you will have seen or read about my challenge last week to The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, to spend a day trying to get about London in a wheelchair. I was very disappointed that Mr Johnson declined my challenge, but he did say that he would ask Transport for London (TFL) to work with me to gain further understanding of the issues regarding accessibility to transport.

Well, I am very pleased to tell you that, The Mayor is as good as his word, as this week I have been contacted by TFL to arrange for me to meet with their Managing Director, Vernon Everitt. I would like to thank The Mayor for facilitating the meeting with Mr Everitt which I will attend along with my manager and representatives from the Whizz Kidz charity. I will keep you all informed as to how we get on.

Road to Rio

700 days to go. 700 more chances to be better than yesterday!

Challenge Boris!

I was interviewed on the ITN news this evening to discuss the accessibility issues regarding public transport in London. I understand that the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson has pledged more funds to help, but to highlight the issue, I challenged the Mayor to spend a day in a wheelchair and to use public transport to get to his appointments! Will you help us #ChallengeBoris on Facebook and Twitter?

Meeting my Train!

Really excited, as I finally got to see "my" train today in a visit to St Pancras station! Thank you to all at South Eastern Railways who made this possible. The Hannah is the 'Javelin' service and is usually whizzing up and down between London and Kent.

Had a fantastic time at the Miami Dolphins Vs Oakland Raiders NFL Game at Wembley Stadium this weekend. I'm slowly learning to understand the game and hoping I can get to see more of the games this year to learn more about it. The guys are amazing athletes, and I got to meet a real gentleman in David Haye.

Feeling like a model!

I had great fun today working with Jameela Jamil, Alex Brooker, Ade Adepitan and Martin Dougan at a photoshoot to promote a new charity which is launching soon. I am very excited to be involved with this charity, as I firmly believe in what they are doing and I look forward to supporting them going forward. Watch this space!

Inspiring others

I was really delighted to be invited to speak at the PiXL Club Student Celebration event in London yesterday. I was lucky enough to meet some amazing and talented young people.

Countdown to Rio

It's two years until the 2016 Paralympics in Rio! My plan is in place. #focused

What a week!

I've had such an amazing couple of days this week, visiting the Sainbury's School Games. Tonight, I took part in "An evening with..." which was the first event that I ever met Baroness Tanni Grey Thompson at, back in 2007 and I cried because I was so star struck!
It's been a real honour to hand out medals and get to spend time with future champions and after a long, hard season, going back to the place where it all started has opened my eyes and helped me refocus and re-motivate myself.

Thank you to those junior athletes who have inspired me this week and showed me again why I fell in love with sport all those years ago.