On the final episode of this series of SportSpiel we cross into the world of Muay Thai and speak to recently-crowned WBC world champion Ellie Harber.

That victory was the 12th title claimed by the 18-year-old from Watford in a variety of martial art disciplines and was her first success in an adult tournament, which saw her win four fights in four days as she went on to secure gold in her maiden senior world championships.

Despite her young age Ellie has come a long way since her first venture into a gym. Not only has the sport provided her with a platform to excel it has proved to be a vital way for her to control her anger and find a way of expressing herself.

What’s more, she’s also let her sport do the talking to quieten the bullies who tried to ridicule her earlier on in life.

Quite simply Ellie is one of an exciting generation of young female athletes proving sport is for them – and for everyone. No doubt she is a superstar in the making.

DISCLAIMER: The audio at the beginning of this interview is unfortunately low quality but improves just after the two-minute mark.

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Music: Otis McDonald

This episode of SportSpiel is a very special one, as we delve into an important subject that is still in its infancy in terms of understanding – becoming a mum during your athletic career.

Taking part in the discussion is long-time friend of the podcast, British Trampolinist Laura Gallagher, as well as England and GB Hockey star Jo Pinner who have both done just that, given birth to their first child in the last 14 months.

With both now on their way back to the top of their sport, they explain just what it takes to become a mum while competing as an athlete – from deciding when to have a child during your career, to the physical toll pregnancy, giving birth and raising a newborn takes on the body.

The pair also explain how inspiration from other athlete mums has helped them on their individual journeys and they delve into how they balance training and childcare.

There’s also the very non-linear process of returning to sports in the first place, essentially having to start again after becoming mums, and so much more more.

Both Laura and Jo talk incredibly openly about their experiences on a topic that still requires plenty of discussion – for context UK Sport’s maternity policy was only introduced in the last year.

We hope you enjoy listening and learning from this very special podcast.

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Music: Otis McDonald

Scotland Rugby’s vice-captain Helen Nelson is one of the most crucial individuals in the squad.

With 55 appearances for the national team to her name she’s been a vital cog as the team looks to progress and improve – striving for bigger goals each time.

With the latest edition of the Women’s Six Nations soon to get underway – with Scotland playing Wales on March 23rd – it’s another opportunity to put that progress to the test.

In this episode of SportSpiel we look ahead to the upcoming Six Nations with Helen – who plays her club rugby with Loughborough Lightning – as well as talking about the journey this Scotland team has been on.

But there’s also a chance to look at Helen’s own journey – from first trying out rugby at the age of six, to becoming a member of the Scottish Alpine ski team, as well as returning to rugby at university after being turned down for football.

As so happened, that university experience helped set her up on the path she’s currently on – and now it’s just as much inspiring the next generation in rugby as it is trying to improve in the here and now.

That’s also something Helen knows all too well – the absence of any true female sporting role models when she was younger was, in her mind, something that could well have had an impact on her as she struggled with body image issues.

It’s another lesson in just how important seeing women’s sport can be. After all – seeing it is believing it.

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Image: With thanks to Claire Jones

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Music: Otis McDonald

Aged just 20, Lilli Ives Campion is widely regarded as one of the brightest prospects in English women’s rugby.

And if it hadn’t been for one seemingly innocuous moment, she might never have even tried the sport to start with.

Ever since then Lilli has gone from strength to strength within the game, making her Premiership Women’s Rugby debut for Loughborough Lightning at just 17 years old.

Now her prospects are continuing to look up as she has joined the senior England squad for training camps this season, including ahead of the upcoming Women’s Six Nations – with England’s first game against Italy on Sunday, March 24.

In this podcast episode Lilli tells us all about her journey so far in rugby, including leaving home at 16 so she could combine her studying with playing.

She also talks about being an ambassador for rugby’s leading mental health charity LooseHeadz and also why she is so excited about what is to come in the sphere of women’s sport – including why the next 10 years are so crucial.

With women’s rugby making its own waves in recent years, the potential is vast for the future, as well as other areas of women’s sport.

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Image: With thanks to Loughborough Lighting and Talent Athlete Group

Music: Otis McDonald

Despite being in her early 20s, Liv Thomas has already experienced a lot in her sporting career.

The GB and England lacrosse midfielder had to wait two years for her England debut, thanks to the Covid pandemic, but after finally earning that first cap she would go on to win a World Cup bronze in triple overtime.

But the difficulties would rear their head again, with Liv rupturing her ACL and tearing her meniscus. From the second she felt it, she knew something bad had happened – and it’s an injury she is still working to come back from eight months on.

That brings in one of the most challenging aspects of being an athlete in her position, as she manages the physical, financial and organisational demands of trying to be at the top of her sport but also needing to have a full time job.

For some athletes an injury like that is devastating enough in terms of severity. But many are able to be afforded much more regular time with physios than someone needing to work at the same time.

But Liv’s motivation is still as strong as ever and there’s another carrot driving her on for more in the future – the 2028 Olympic Games.

Lacrosse will be returning to the Olympic stage for those Games in Los Angeles with the IOC approving its inclusion back in October 2023.

For someone like Liv that represents an incredible opportunity and the chance to fulfil a dream, to become an Olympian.

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Image: With thanks to Liv Thomas

Music: Otis McDonald

Don’t die wondering – that’s Laura Siddall’s motto – and it’s a phrase you can see applied to so much of her life as a pro athlete.

Laura now is a hugely successful British triathlete but her path into professional sport came relatively late in life.

While sport was always important growing up she would go on to do a degree in Mechanical Engineering before taking a gap year as an officer in the British Army.

She would go on to work in the corporate world and moved to Sydney in Australia back in 2007 on a two-year assignment. Then came triathlon, a sport she tried out a year after moving to Australia and with great success.

After progressing from a rookie to securing four amateur world champion titles she took the plunge in 2013 and decided to become a pro, going full time in 2014 and moving to San Francisco to chase the dream.

She is now a four-time Ironman Champion, which includes winning Ironman Australia for three consecutive years (2017, 2018, 2019), Ironman New Zealand (2018), and also becoming the ETU European Long Distance Champion in 2018.

These days, as she marks 10 years as a professional, she is based primarily in Boulder in the USA where she is coached by fellow Brit Julie Dibens – but the recent past has brought her significant hurdles.

Most notably, last year, Laura was hit by a car during the bike leg at Ironman Brazil. It knocked her unconscious and left her with a slight brain bleed and concussion.

The journey back has been a battle of the mind just as much as it has been physically, and there have been questions about where her journey goes from here. But that phrase – don’t die wondering – is still present in her decision making.

As also becomes clear in this podcast, Laura is a passionate advocate for women’s sport and is both an athlete ambassador for the Women’s Sport Trust as well as being a member of their Unlocked programme back in 2022.

Quite simply she is an inspiration to many regardless of what your involvement is in sport – and perhaps we all need a little bit of that motto in our lives.

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Image: With thanks to Laura Siddall

Music: Otis McDonald

Isla Mackenzie is on a mission – to inspire the next generation as she chases her dream of being a racing driver.

Her early life is world’s away from what it looks like now. She grew up on a dairy farm on the Isle of Lewis, in the Scottish Outer Hebrides and she was driving anything she could as soon as she was old enough to reach the pedals – be it quad bikes or tractors, and she drove a car for the first time at the age of 12.

Isla comes alive with speed – a description given by her mum – and a passion for motorsport was always there.

Fast forward to now and she finds herself fulfilling that passion, in her role as a Dyno Technician for the Mercedes F1 Team, the team that seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton currently races for.

But, while the engineering side of her life is seriously impressive, her true calling is to race herself – and the talent is there.

She has been fast-tracked from karts to single seaters, she signed with IMC Motorsport and, in 2023, there were opportunities in the Monoposto Formula 3 championship.

Her journey has also been the subject of a BBC documentary – the episode Fast Track to Glory in the series Our Lives – which details just how determined she is to succeed. But it also shows just how seriously she takes inspiring the next generation of female racers, something that is evident in this podcast.

It’s a long-talked about issue, and while Isla undoubtedly wants to succeed for herself, the chance to pave the way for others adds all the extra fuel to the fire that she will ever need.

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Image: With thanks to Isla Mackenzie

Additional thanks to the Athlete Media Group for helping to organise this interview

Music: Otis McDonald

Ben Gallagher is a remarkable individual. After serving in the British Army for over 16 years, his life was turned upside down in 2019 when he was shot numerous times on active duty.

Ben would sustain blast and fragmentation injuries to his upper torso and arms as a result of that incident – and without a doubt his body armour saved his life.

What followed was a number of operations and extensive surgery to reconstruct his left arm, while he now also has surgical injuries to both legs.

But this was all just the beginning of an immense battle.

What happened to Ben was utterly traumatic and, along with a long period of rehabilitation, he felt lost, isolated, unable to come to terms with what happened and he would have suicidal thoughts. Subsequently he would also be diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Ben’s journey – and turnaround since then – has been remarkable – and sport has played a key part in it. He can now say he’s represented his country at the 2023 Invictus Games – winning gold in the Men’s IR6 4-minute endurance row and bronze in the men’s IRB3 crit cycle race.

And another major achievement could be on the horizon – the Paris 2024 Paralympics.

Ben’s journey in rowing, which began with simply using rowing machines for exercise has developed into something so much more.

He has raced at the British Rowing Indoor Championships and he is now classified with British Rowing – on the GB Para-Rowing World Class and Paralympic Academy Programme with reaching those Paris 2024 Games very much the aim.

This is just a snapshot of what Ben has achieved, as you’ll hear in this podcast there has been so much else along the way and he is also an ambassador for our charity partners The Mintridge Foundation.

Quite simply you’ll be hard pushed to find someone with a more inspiring message than this army veteran.

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Image: With thanks to Ben Gallagher

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Music: Otis McDonald

Beth Gill is one of Britain’s – and the world’s – leading canoeists. In 2022 she became C1 short course Marathon World Champion and she’s hoping to qualify for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games in the C2 500m Sprint.

Remember, while there’s been women’s kayak events, women’s canoeing events only first arrived at the Olympics for Tokyo 2020.

But there’s much more to Beth than just her sport as she has become a passionate advocate for raising awareness over the pollution in our rivers and waterways, as well as their ecological importance.

The situation is serious. To put it into perspective, Beth says that in training its almost expected by some that you will get sickness bugs along the way. That can’t be acceptable.

In this episode of SportSpiel, Beth explains why she is so passionate about this issue, as well as how it inspired her choice to take up a university course in this area.

She also explains what individuals can do to try and make a difference in their daily lives, with current practices needing to change.

There’s also time to delve into Beth’s journey in canoeing, which hasn’t always been smooth sailing.

She transitioned to the sport in 2014 via the Girls4Gold programme – with her first experience in a canoe not getting off to the best start – but she also recalls being dropped from her canoeing programme five years ago, something that has taught her valuable lessons and helped her get back to where she is today.

Now, the Olympic Games in Paris are firmly in her sights.

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Image: With thanks to British Canoeing and canoephotography.com/Bence Vekassy (ICF)

Additional thanks to the Athlete Media Group for helping to organise this interview

Music: Otis McDonald

British weightlifter Mercy Brown has been on an extensive journey in her sporting career. But the comeback is very much on.

The 26-year-old Londoner is an exciting talent and secured gold in the 2022 British Weightlifting Championships.

But, unfortunately, her year didn’t pan out as expected despite that promising start and indication that the potential is very much there.

Throughout her rollercoaster ride in the sport there have had to be breaks for Mercy to prioritise her own self-care and mental wellbeing.

There is no substitute for looking after yourself as best as you can and it is all part of that personal development.

She also admits, in this episode of SportSpiel, about how tough it has been losing her coach of so many years, after he passed away.

Part of that connection was that he had a team of lifters who looked like her and she emphasises just how important it is to know an individual’s culture.

But what shines from Mercy throughout this interview is how much she cares and how important it is to give back.

Whether it’s helping to support her own Afro-Caribbean community, or looking to change the nonsensical stereotype that strength sports are masculine, she has that inner drive to make a difference.

That has helped see her become part of the Women’s Sport Trust’s famed Unlocked programme and she’s now a firm fixture in what she calls an army of people looking to change women’s sport for the better.

Going forward now is where the comeback comes into play. Tournaments are booked in and Mercy is ready to get competing regularly again.

But, while she admits she’s nearer the end of her career than she is to the start she is determined to give her absolute all in the next couple of years.

With the talent and commitment she has that success is likely to follow, and she might just be appearing on that Olympic stage soon enough.

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Image: With thanks to Mercy Brown

Music: Otis McDonald