Dame Sarah Storey’s incessant hunger means that she has barely had a chance to let her hair down since becoming the most decorated female British Paralympian of all time. Last week Storey surpassed Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson’s record of 11 Paralympic golds with victory in the C5 individual pursuit and all the evidence suggests the thought of taking it easy has not crossed her mind for one second.
Coupled with her natural ability on a bike, that relentless will to win is why Storey remains as awesome as ever at the age of 38 and the message for any budding British athletes hoping to catch her is that she wants to keep pulling away from Grey-Thompson’s tally.
Storey topped a Paralympic podium for the 13th time after winning the C5 time trial on the road in Pontal on Wednesday, a victory that took ParalympicsGB clear of their tally of 34 gold medals at London 2012, and it will be a shock if she does not complete a hat-trick in Rio by making a successful defence of her road race title on Saturday.
Do not expect Storey to announce her retirement if she wins – she has already spoken about competing at Tokyo 2020.
It is 24 years since Storey made her Paralympic debut as a swimmer but her coach, Gary Brickley, believes that she is talented enough to race in the Olympics. “When you look at the differences between her and the Olympic team, she should really be in the team pursuit Olympic team in terms of the engine that she’s got,” he said. “I think she can prove you can win the Olympics at 42, like Kristin Armstrong did. You can’t give those excuses any more, that you’re missing a hand, that you have a child, or you’re too old because, on paper, her stats say she’s one of the best horses on the track.”
Storey gave birth to her daughter Louisa three years ago. Supported by her husband Barney, Storey has been able to stay with her away from the athletes’ village.
“Louisa’s a bubbly kid that’s not out for grabbing attention all the time,” Brickley said. “Every training camp and competition Louisa is with her. She’s timed it perfectly after the last Games, come back after a year and she trained all the way up to just before she gave birth. She had a long period of breastfeeding which she worked through really well, so she’d get to the top of the hill and breastfeed at the end.
“So when people say: ‘I can’t train or do exercise because I’ve got a child,’ that’s nonsense. Some bits have been a little bit difficult, like she couldn’t bring Louisa into the village so she had to be a little bit outside. But in some ways that’s better because it gives her a little bit of peace.”
The road race has been billed as a confrontation of sorts between Storey and Kadeena Cox, one of the new stars of cycling and athletics. Cox is the first British Paralympian to win two golds in different sports in the same Games since 1984, breaking the world record in last weekend’s 500m time trial in the velodrome and in the T38 400m in the Olympic Stadium on Wednesday.
The 25-year-old, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis two years ago, is a cycling novice. Storey was a similarly quick learner after making the switch from swimming in 2005.
Contain your excitement, though. A natural sprinter, Cox is not expected to last the pace in the road race and she might not make it to the start line after injuring her right hamstring when Britain won silver in the 4x100m relay on Thursday night. It was her fourth medal: she won bronze in the T38 100m on Friday last week.
While their strengths lie in different areas, Cox looks up to Storey and also harbours ambitions of returning to non‑disabled sport one day.
“Sarah is an amazing person to have on the team and to get advice from,” Cox said. “She’s been behind me and supported me and talked me through the 500 even though we were competing against each other.
“She’s achieved some amazing things. I know that she did some stuff on the able-bodied team and I want to follow in her footsteps and see if I can do something in the able-bodied cycling team.
“It’s going to be a lot of hard work but it’s something that I’d really like to do. She is someone you can go to because she has a wealth of knowledge. She has been around since before I was born. She’s got so much to give and is so helpful. She’s a nice person to be around.
“Hopefully I will be in the road race – I am not sure if I will make it there. It has been a really good championships. I got spiked and have a hamstring injury which needs to be checked. I am not necessarily going to be in there. I have had a great championships and if I can be on the start line, I will be there.”
But even if Cox does make it, Storey is unlikely to view her as a threat.
