by Stuart WeirFemke Bol 400m hurdles champion
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone is a great athlete with an immense talent but she does it very much on her own terms. The question has been asked: does Sydney actually enjoy running? In the past two years I have seen Sydney run only in the Olympics in Paris. Outside of those Olympics, I think I have seen Femke run 15 times in the past two years. I have had a significant one to one interview with Femke plus loads of mixed zone chats. A couple of years ago I remember talking to Femke at the European team championship – an event that most top athletes skip. I asked Femke why she had decided to come. Her answer was that she loved running for Netherlands. A further example of that was in Tokyo this week her decision to compromise her chances in the individual event by running the mixed relay in advance of the individual event. Femke is an athlete who loves running, loves representing her country and is always happy to chat to media. She is somehow a cross between an international superstar and the girl next door.
In Tokyo this week, she ran 53. 75 in the prelim, 52.31 In the semi-final and 51.54 in the final. You kind of have to suspect that if there had been a fourth round in Tokyo this week, she would have shaved another fraction of a second off her time. Talking about the race, she said: “The race always starts hard for me but I know my strong points. We worked really hard on this and I’ve got this pretty comfortably. My job is just to keep running, keep the focus and do one hurdle at a time. This is my second gold medal in a row which makes me really proud. This means the world to me. At these world championships I had to keep my title. I am proud of myself and my team for doing it. This year we tried to change some things in training to get better at finishing the race. I really improved myself with that. Today I tried to keep my speed. I was pushing and cruising. The last 100m was the best I’ve had all season, that is what was special today. I always try to keep focusing on my execution. I know the race will get hard, 400m hurdles always does. I was focused on myself and running for my life until I made it through the line”.
Asked about her level of confidence going into the race, she said: “I knew it was a strong field. The Americans are always so strong, so I was ready to put up a good race, and I felt really good, and I’m so proud still to be strong in this strange season, going on so long and having now the peak so late. I think it’s just important to save enough energy in heats and semis, but also keep your confidence high and to prioritize recovery. I slept like a baby these last few days and lay a lot in bed, ate a lot. I really learned this year to keep a bit more calm, to focus on things outside of sports also. And I think that helped me a lot this year. Normally I’m stressed out like crazy but I could really keep my nerve under control this year. And I think I just found this by having a great time with the people I love around me, spending time with them. I’ve had, on the track, a great season, and I’m the luckiest girl alive to be engaged to Ben”. (Bed Broeders the pole-vaulter).
Femke once told me that she had started to do athletics when she was seven or eight because her brother was doing it. “It seemed fun so I asked to do it. A lot of my friends were there and we just enjoyed going to all the meets and different competitions. In 2015 I went to my first championship [European Youth Olympic Festival, Tbilisi] after winning Dutch Under 18 champs in 56.14] and that was when I started to run 400. Qualifying for the championship made me think that perhaps I have some talent. Maybe I can handle the lactic. When I discovered the hurdles I found something I was good at. I like it and it is natural for me and I am running crazy times. From 2015 I started to take it more seriously and not go to parties and things. When I was 16 I started training at the national Olympic center in Arnhem which is a 40 minute drive and my parents had to bring me several days per week. I did take it seriously because I always wanted to be the best I could be. I’m at a higher level now, and that is still what I try to do”.
She told me she was surprised how quickly she progressed in the sport: “Especially in 2021 when I went from 53.7 to 52.03 and on the same spikes with nothing changed. I do ask some times, how have I achieved these things but I work hard for it and I do so many things for it’s not like I click my fingers and I get it. But still there are a lot of other athletes who train just as hard and are not achieving these things. I do ask how I have achieved this and I think it’s amazing. And I am enjoying it a lot, which helps”.
I asked her why she ran so often. Her reply was: “I love racing, that’s my favorite part. I love training but I also love racing. I also think that racing is the way to try out new things and get into a rhythm. You could say that I don’t need them but I do like them. I think Diamond Leagues are huge and I still well remember my first Diamond League and thinking ‘Whao, I’m allowed to race in the Diamond League with all these top athletes’. It’s just one of the competitions and I love to race in them. If I can, I like to run in Diamond Leagues – if it’s not too much. I think it’s a nice for the sport to do different races. Sometimes I don’t run as fast as I want to but I’m still trying to develop in the races.
Femke is a lovely person but also with a touch of the sadist as she once told me: “I love to go through the lactic and go deeper and go faster. In training, if I am full of lactic, I do one more – when we have a lot of reps in a session”.
It seems to be working.
