Jessica Ennis: Unbelievable - From My Childhood Dreams to Winning Olympic Gold by Jessica Ennis

Author:Jessica Ennis
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3, epub
Tags: Biography & Autobiography, Sports
ISBN: 9781444768619
Publisher: Hachette UK
Published: 2012-11-08T08:00:00+00:00

8

THE BIG TIME

It was a letter I got at the end of 2010 that showed me there is another, less welcome side to being in the public eye. I was one of many athletes who chose not to go to the Commonwealth Games, staged in Delhi in October 2010. The reason was simple. They were being held far too late in the year. My year is built around the major summer championships and training blocks are geared to that, so travelling to India in October was going to throw everything out of synch.

There were all sorts of problems in the build-up to Delhi and some people were portrayed as cowards for not competing there. For me, though, it had nothing to do with security, dengue fever, dodgy safety certificates or falling footbridges. It was just bad timing.

One man did not see it that way. He sent me a very long letter explaining how disappointed he was and how I was letting the whole country down. How could I turn down the opportunity to represent my country? He was clearly someone who would die for England and he raged on. ‘I will not be supporting you in 2012,’ he concluded. I found that upsetting.

There have been other messages, including a few about death. One man said he wanted to take Myla out for a walk and spoke about us walking on a beach and dying together. That got reported to the police. There are others that are a bit creepy. Generally, I try to take them lightly and with a bit of humour, but Andy gets worried. There can also be a few intense and, at times, rather creepy people around the tracks too. Maybe it is the fact that it’s a sport where women do not wear a great deal. I find that the best policy is to be respectful and polite wherever possible, while Jane generally tried to keep anything odd away from me.

Generally, though, I get nice letters. After Berlin I received lots of lovely messages from kids addressed simply to ‘Jessica Ennis, World Champion’. There would be autograph requests and homemade cards. I was touched.

People are usually nice and the opportunities that winning the world and European titles brought were beyond a Sheffield schoolgirl’s dreams. So when Adidas asked Jane if I would like to go to Los Angeles to do a photo-shoot with David Beckham, she said yes immediately and added that she would need to come too.

Andy also came along as chaperone and we flew out to a lovely boutique hotel, the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood. It was a haven for proper stars rather than a Yorkshire heptathlete. In one corner sat Usher, the R&B megastar, flanked by huge bodyguards. I said hello and was unashamedly starry-eyed. Apparently, there was a recording studio at the hotel and Cheryl Cole was also staying there.

On the day of the shoot we were driven up into the Hollywood hills to a huge glass-fronted mansion that looked out over the city.

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