Cycling, crystals and cutting-edge science: the secrets of Hodgkinson and Hunter Bell’s success
Trevor Painter and Jenny Meadows, who oversaw gold medal success in Torun for Keely Hodgkinson and Georgia Hunter Bell, believe the best is yet to come for the pairIt was the architect of London 2012 Olympics who said it best, shortly after Britain’s Keely Hodgkinson, Georgia Hunter Bell and Molly Caudery had lit up the World Indoor Championships with three gold medals in 29 minutes,“That was a towering moment, not just for UK Athletics but for British sport,” said Sebastian Coe, now the president of World Athletics,“It was very exciting, hugely inspirational,I really do hope they cause a stampede to local athletics clubs, particularly among young girls,”Soon afterwards, Trevor Painter and Jenny Meadows, the husband and wife coaching team who have guided Hodgkinson and Hunter Bell to glory, were explaining the secrets behind their success – ranging from cycling to crystals to cutting-edge science – before predicting the best was yet to come.
Painter says Hodgkinson was feeling so good she felt she might break her world indoor 800m record again in Sunday’s final, despite having raced twice in two days.“Warming up she said, ‘I feel amazing.I won’t be surprised if I get a PB here’,” says Painter.“I went, ‘OK, your PB is a world record’.Afterwards she had no lactic [acid].
And she was like: ‘I’m just going to do the 4x400m relay,’ and an hour later she ran 50,1sec,”No one in the field of specialist 400m runners ran quicker, which makes Painter believe that even greater peaks are around the corner, including Hodgkinson possibly taking down the 800m outdoor world record, set in 1983,What has changed? “It’s the first time since Budapest in 2023 where she’s turned up to a championship 100% healthy,” says Painter,“Even at the Paris Olympics she had a bit of a niggle and missed some of the winter.
But this year she’s not missed a session,So we’re seeing times she normally does in summer already,”Painter says it helps that Nike has given them a budget for a physiotherapist, Alison Rose, who has kept Hodgkinson’s hamstring problems under control and a physiologist, Rachel McCormick, who formerly worked at the Australian Institute of Sport,“Keely’s just in a very happy place at the moment relationships-wise,” says Painter,“She’s moving house, so that’s exciting, when you have all those things coming together.
”Hodgkinson believes Himalayan salt crystals and a Himalayan salt lamp have helped calm her.“It’s about making the human happy,” says Painter.“If they’re in a happy place they’re going to perform well.”Meadows stresses how Hodgkinson and Hunter Bell push each other in training, with the former having more speed and the latter more speed endurance.Despite often going head-to-head they remain great friends.
“They’re a dynamic duo,” she says.“They elevate each other,” says Painter.They are very different personalities, however.Shortly after she broke the world indoor 800m in February, Hodgkinson had a night on the town with her friends to celebrate her birthday when she bumped into Coe and Manchester United’s CEO, Collette Roche.“We thought it was quite funny,” says Meadows.
“But we do keep reminding ourselves that Keely can’t be a robot.“Georgia’s like me.I was a robot and I’m very analytical.Georgia’s exactly the same.But Keely’s a free spirit.
You have to keep things flexible for her.”One big shift over the winter is that Hodgkinson has started cycling on her easy endurance days and she enjoys it so much that one-hour sessions sometimes turn into 90 minutes.“We’ve had to rein her back,” says Meadows.“It’s just great though.She finds it so boring on a static bike or the elliptical [machine] in the gym.
If she wants to carry on in this sport for a decade or more, we have to let her enjoy life.”It is that approach to coaching – art, science and the arm around the shoulder – that make Painter and Meadows among the best in the world.“Trevor does all the programming and he’s absolutely brilliant,” says Meadows.“There can be seven different training sessions going on within the same session because everyone’s so bespoke.Keely needs a little bit more of this, Georgia needs that, somebody else needs something else.
I don’t know how he does it.”Painter says a key part of his philosophy is that he does not want athletes doing too much long slow running for the aerobic content of the training.“We have to have speed work, lactate work, threshold work and then long slow volume, so we do as much of the long slow stuff on bikes, in swimming pools, on cross trainers, or ellipticals,” he says.“It’s up to each individual.Some girls love swimming, some like cycling.
As long as they’re giving me, say, 45 minutes on a bike, it’s as good as 30-35 minutes on the running, but without the impact.Then when we run on the track and we’re doing sessions we feel sharper and the sessions are better.”Painter says that even with her science background, McCormick has been surprised with how quickly Hodgkinson and Hunter Bell recover between sessions.“A lot of the science has been done on 5k, 10k and marathon runners,” he says.“You look at Jakob Ingebrigtsen and it’s all double threshold work and keeping your blood lactate down sub-four, things like that.
“She’s testing us and we’re up in the 20s And then she’s like: ‘Oh they’re going to be screwed for like a week here’,Then two days later we’re up in 20s again and she’s blown away by how we’ve worked like that and then come back and do it again,It’s down to a steady buildup of work over the years,”Painter believes McCormick’s work is just getting started,“In the long term, she’s going to be of massive help in terms of how we get even better.
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Family courts in England and Wales ‘not good enough’ for women and children, minister says
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Experts consider expanding meningitis vaccine eligibility after Kent outbreak
Experts are considering the case for routinely vaccinating more people against meningitis B in response to the fatal outbreak in Kent.The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s review was announced after the health secretary, Wes Streeting, asked it to “re-examine eligibility for meningitis vaccines” for a wider range of people than those who now qualify.Health officials in Kent, where there have been two fatalities, said cases could spread outside the county as students return home for Easter. On Friday the UK Health Security Agency said there were 18 confirmed cases, and 11 more under investigation.The Guardian understands the JCVI started a review of the outbreak in Kent and is considering a wider review of eligibility for routine meningitis B vaccinations
Volunteers in the UK: what happened when your local charity shut down?
Across the UK, many small charities face increasing financial pressures, forcing some to shut their doors. When this happens, it can leave the people who relied on those services without support - and volunteers and communities trying to step in and keep things going.We’d like to hear from volunteers who have experienced a charity closing. Have you or others tried to continue the work informally and what were the challenges of doing that? Did you try to keep it going - and what difficulties did you face? What happened to the people who depended on the service?You can share your experience using this form.Please include as much detail as possible
‘It all feels very natural’: Britain’s sauna boom heats up as people seek warmth of human connection
From fields to floating pontoons, in horseboxes, barrels and beach huts, saunas are springing up across Britain. The British Sauna Society now lists about 640 saunas – up from 540 at the start of the year – while a recent report predicted that the UK could become the world’s largest sauna market by 2033, outpacing even Finland and Germany.“The continuing growth suggests that the peak has still yet to come – if there is one,” said Gabrielle Reason, the society’s director. But are saunas a tonic for the nation’s health – or a wellness fad with hidden risks?When it comes to measurable health effects, the strongest evidence relates to the cardiovascular benefits of sauna use. These are “substantial”, said Prof Setor Kunutsor, the Evelyn Wyrzykowski research chair in cardiology at the University of Manitoba in Canada
Kent meningitis outbreak may have peaked as UKHSA reports slowdown in cases
The Kent meningitis outbreak may have reached its peak after only two new cases were reported by officials on Friday.The UK Health and Security Agency said that as of 12.30pm on Thursday, there were 18 confirmed and 11 probable cases of meningitis linked to the Kent outbreak, taking the total number of people with the disease to 29. Of the confirmed cases, 13 were meningitis B.While the growth in cases may have slowed, the situation remains serious, with all cases requiring hospital admission
The Kent meningitis outbreak: what is happening and why?
The deadly outbreak of meningitis in Kent has fuelled concerns about how far the disease will spread and seen the return of people wearing masks and queueing for vaccines. The scenes are reminiscent of the Covid crisis, but meningitis is very different. Here we look at how the outbreak has unfolded.Meningitis is a potentially lethal but uncommon disease caused by viruses and bacteria that trigger inflammation of the meninges, the protective linings that cover the brain. The Kent outbreak is driven by meningococcal bacteria which are found in the nose and throat of about 10% of the population
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