Life's a beach - John Mcfall Olympic hopeful

My name's John. I'm a Paralympic athlete. I'm out here in Portugal. It's been a nice few days so far. I got here last Thursday. I'm a sprinter. My class is T42 and I'm out here to train for a couple of weeks. I've been an amputee for seven and a half years now or so. I lost my leg in August or September of the year 2000 in a motorcycle accident in Thailand. I was just being a bit of a boy riding on a scooter too fast on a little island called Koh Samui. Went around a corner too fast, lost control of the bike and I went down with it and did a lot of damage to my leg in the process when I crashed the bike. As a result, a couple of days later, I actually had to have my leg amputated. I've been into athletics ever since I was actually a bit of a whippersnapper from probably about seven or eight years old when I first went to boarding school. I was a reasonable little runner when I was a kid up until about the age of 14. Then all the boys in my year grew around me. I didn't really grow until I was about 16 so I stuck to hockey. As I got into my mid-teens, I wanted to join the army. That's what my plan was before I went away to go travelling. When I lost my leg, one of those things that I really wanted to get back was the sound of that wind that you get rushing past your ears when you run. It's that feeling, that sound that you get under your own steam that I really missed. That's what I wanted to get back. I taught myself to run in early 2002 as soon as I had the tools to do it, the right prosthesis and stuff. A couple of years later, in 2004, I had my first ever outdoor competition. My first ever competition as a Paralympic athlete. I did not too bad. Subsequent to that, the following year in 2005, I started training a little bit more regularly and had my first competition for Great Britain in the summer of 2005. It was the European Championships in Espoo in Helsinki. At that competition, I got my first international championship medal. I got a bronze medal in the 200 metres. I was absolutely ecstatic to come away with a medal in my first major championship. I was pretty stoked. That was the fuel for going back, getting back on the track, back in the gym and really starting to take this really seriously. Here we are today. I'm in pretty fantastic shape at the moment. Training really hard. Training is going really well. I've got a lot to look forward to this year. This is my coach, Darrell. He's the guy who looks after me, gives me all my sessions. He generally keeps me on the straight and narrow. Generally? Generally. Better than I thought it would be, I have to say. Stayed nice and controlled through the last 50. Didn't feel like I was having to change my rhythm at all. Felt pretty strong. Stayed relaxed, which is exactly what I want. Lungs are burning a little bit, but I think that's the tail end of the cold. A little bit there. All in all, pretty good. One more set to go. Same as the first one, 60-140-60. All in all, feeling pretty good. Time for a drink now, I think.