'If you want it, you can do it' - Catherina takes a different path

Interview

Paul Fitzpatrick caught up with Catherina McKiernan 25 years on from her win in the London Marathon.

Catherina McKiernan and the words she uses.

“Settled”. “A quiet mind”. “Silence”. “That quiet place”. “That settles me.” A few syllables that paint a portrait of a singular person.

And the ones she doesn’t? They’ll become apparent.

Twenty-five years on from her victory in the London Marathon, the Celt spends half an hour in Catherina’s company and it feels like half a minute. Her status as a sporting icon is secure but she’s not one for basking in that very much – she wasn’t back then, she isn’t now.

Not long into it, she begins to talk about the psychology of sport and you can see where her passion lies these days.

“My son Patrick here, he has these ideas like any 17-year-old. I said to him earlier, ‘well Patrick, what do you want? And how badly do you want it? And how much are you willing to work towards it?’,” she explains.

“And they’re the three questions that I would ask anybody in anything in life. You might have these great ideas but if you’re not willing to put in the work… you have to be willing. If you put your mind to something and decide that you really want to do it and nothing is going to stop you, of course you can achieve whatever your goal is.

“But that is the challenge. People have these ideas but when you nail them and ask them the questions, are you willing to work, how much are you willing to suffer, how much are you willing to work towards achieving your goals, with anything in life… If they’re himming and hawing (laughs) then you know that it’s just a fantasy.”

It’s interesting, you note, that she used the word ‘suffer’…

“I don’t think I used the word ‘suffer’, did I?” she interjects.

“Ah well, if I did I didn’t mean to…. Because I don’t like to use that word ‘suffer’, or ‘pain’ isn’t a good word. Yeah, maybe I did use the word ‘suffer’. I suppose, discomfort (is a better word). And how are you willing to work? How much are you willing to put into it?”

I’d imagine you have to have a high threshold for pain, physically and mentally, you suggest, in a candidate for one of the most inane questions any marathon runner has ever faced.

“Discomfort!” she corrects you, with a mock-scolding chuckle.

“And your question is… is everyone cut out for that? If you want. If you want it, of course, you can do it. And if you’re willing to put everything aside, put your life on hold, of course.

“That’s why I can’t understand – well, it’s not fair for me to say ‘understand’ because if everyone was like me, we’d have a strange world – but it’s such a short period of time, a sportsperson’s career, that for me, I can’t understand when somebody who’s talented isn’t willing to put in that effort.

“Because there’s a lot of time to work and do whatever you want to do afterwards but if you have that talent, for me it’s difficult to understand. I should understand it but coming from where I come from, knowing that you can only do it for a certain length of time and then that you’ll miss it so badly when you can’t do it, it’s difficult for me to understand why people don’t want to put in that effort.”

McKiernan found it difficult to adjust when she stopped competing. In our last interview, she joked that she gets withdrawal symptoms if she goes two days without a run. In that regard, she has improved, she confirms, again laughing it off. The sense is that she likes to run but she no longer needs to - and that’s a big difference.

The 26th of this month marks the silver anniversary of her success in London. When she looks back, she is content but there is a hint of wistfulness there too – and how could there not be? She was in the prime of her life, running brilliantly, at the peak of human performance in her own discipline, a level few can say they have ever reached, in anything.

Questions about that element of it – her pursuit of perfection, her absolute excellence, her world class ability – she tends to brush over quite quickly. She recounts more vividly a snippet of conversation a dozen or so miles into the race.

“It was a good time alright. I was 27, everything just seemed easy. I suppose, you do reach a peak and when you’re winning, the confidence gets very high. I felt I was unbeatable alright at that point. I should have cherished it more because it doesn’t last (laughs).

“When you’re in the middle of it you think it’s going to last forever but that’s not the case.

“It was only my second marathon so I wasn’t that familiar with the marathon. Liz McColgan had ran a lot of marathons and my plan was to just stick with her as long as possible. I think she had just been out-sprinted the previous year by Joyce Chepchumba who was also in the race.

“My plan was to stick with her because I reckoned she knew what she was at. But then these two other girls built up a lead on us and they could have been 80-plus seconds ahead of us at halfway.

“I was relaxed enough because Liz McColgan was in the group I was in as was the girl who had won the previous year. At halfway, we got word back that they were a good bit ahead of us and Liz said to me, ‘you better do something if you’re able’, kind of thing. So I went chasing them down and reeled them in and just kept going.

“It was very nice of her, actually, thinking back. I don’t think it would be that common to do something like that. She ended up coming second, she did go through a bad patch but she pulled through, she is as tough as nails.

“She had known my form from the previous marathon and in the lead up to it and she knew I was possibly the favourite. Looking back, it was very kind of her to say that to me.”

Having led a breakaway and hunted down the leaders, stomach cramps set in. The closing miles were run in extreme… discomfort, maybe, would be her preferred choice of word. How did she keep going?

“I just was so mentally prepared for that race from the training. I think the mental strength comes from good preparation, once you know that you have done all the training that you possibly could do, that gives you a lot of confidence.

“I had prepared very well for it, for some reason I was going to win that race by hook or by crook. I think it was such a big event and there was so much hype and the family being over, it was a race that we would have always watched ourselves at home when it was on.

“I was just grateful that I was able to be in it. All of those thoughts that I had built up in the months of training towards it. Even though the stomach cramps were very uncomfortable, I just ran through that discomfort…”

It’s when talking about the mental approach to sport that Catherina is thoroughly engaged. That is now her passion, she says. Passing on her knowledge, she finds enriching.

“I’ve started doing some sports psychology and reading up on that and I think it can help a lot, it really, really can. A lot of the time or most of the time, we get in our own way with our thoughts and that’s what holds us back so we need to have strategies… I’m not just saying about sport but anything in life.

“We need to have ways to catch those negative thoughts and not make a big deal about them, not make a movie about them as they say. Realise that they’re detrimental and certainly not doing us any favours in life in general.

“We often talk about the flow or the zone in sport and what that is in very simple terms is having a quiet mind, having no negative distractions that are going to hold you back from your performance.

“Although whatever it is is still challenging, you are able to work through it because there are no negative thoughts holding you back. It just goes to show the power of those negative thoughts.

“If you can get into that quiet place where there’s nothing holding you back, you’re certainly going to get the most out of yourself. Say, for instance in a football match when things start to go wrong and the heads go down and you allow those negative thoughts to build up, the performance is going to get worse and worse so we need to really work on the mindset.

“I’m doing more and more of it, yeah, and will do more and more of it. That’s what I love now and settles me now, I suppose. Obviously I like to go for walks and I like to go for runs but this is my vision, to be able to help people get out of their way. That’s the way I would put it.

“People who are trying to achieve their goals, whatever that is, that they’re willing to get out of their own way, that they’re willing to listen, that they’re willing to learn, that they’re willing to go through the process.

“And surrounding yourself with good people, with people that are positive and people that can encourage you, that’s important too. And staying a million miles away from negativity because that’s a simple little thing that can begin to get you down, can begin to get the mind racing, can cause you to doubt yourself.”

Catherina’s own upbringing in Cornafean has been well documented. She grew up on a farm surrounded by a large family and didn’t run competitively until she was nearly finished secondary school. It gave her a grounding which, like her soft Cavan accent, she never lost, no matter where her career took her – and it took her everywhere.

Her family were very supportive but didn’t interfere and, looking back, she is grateful for that.

“I suppose we were ahead of our time in a lot of senses and Joe Doonan was ahead of his time and even my family, I’m only realising that now. I only did an interview with a youngster last week, he is in his final year in college and he was asking me about my parents, how much of an influence they had in my career.

“And the biggest influence they had was saying nothing. Because parents can say the wrong things as well, it’s just that bond. It’s very, very seldom it works whereby a parent can coach their own children – in the odd circumstances but generally not. I think that parents should just keep quiet and say nothing because they can get in the way and say the wrong things. I suppose I was lucky that they didn’t say anything.

“And my brothers and sisters as well in fairness to them, I suppose it was a little bit challenging for them as well because it was all new to them. But they didn’t say anything. And silence is better than words itself.”

They were all there to cheer her coming down the Mall but, on the road, she was just in a rhythm, oblivious.

“They all came to London alright but when you go to a marathon, all you see is somebody running past you very quickly, that’s all. Although they did go from tube station to tube station and saw me a few times. I wouldn’t have seen them because I was (laughs)… I was in the flow, I was focused.”

You wouldn’t have heard them roaring you on?

“Oh God, no. All you hear is kind of a noise in the back of your head, there are so many people shouting and cheering you on. There’s a lot of noise and that’s part of it as well, part of getting into that zone, into that quiet place.”

Genetics, natural ability, is one thing but that desire to be the best one can be (in the lead-up to London, she ran 110 miles a week in training) is usually what separates the elite from the rest.

Experience of sportspeople tells you that behind her gentle personality, there must be a stone-cold killer lurking, that no-one could compete as she did and win what she won at the very highest level without that instinct.

But not an ounce of that bitterness – that sweet kind of spite - which often drives elite sportspeople is discernible. She’s just her own person, at ease with life and her place in it, the restlessness of the retired athlete now having faded away, her burgeoning work with others filling that void.

Catherina laughs easily. When the phone reception drops briefly, she self-deprecatingly picks up where she left off, “what was I was on about there, what was I at?!”.

“A little bit different, I suppose,” is how she describes her younger self.

“Socially, I didn’t need other people as such. I was quite happy going to bed at 10 o’clock on a Saturday night and looking forward to having a long run or a hard race the next day. That was part of the package, the important part. A lot of people can have talent but they don’t have that discipline to put in that time and that effort into getting the most out of themselves and I had that.”

You put it to her – another stupid question - that her closing mile, 5.15, was an extraordinary effort but she is not comfortable, or perhaps just not interested, in talking about her own greatness. She reluctantly agrees that it was… “good”.

“What was it? 5.15… I was in a hurry to finish at that stage! It was… yeah. Looking back on it, yeah, it was good. I want to be modest but, yeah… All that training and some of it was adrenaline as well, when you see that finish line.”

That’s as far as it goes, before a proviso is added.

“And also, there was such a noise that day that I thought all the time that there was someone coming up behind me. “I thought it was a very close race and I just kept pushing on, pushing on. I always had this mantra as well, the faster I run, the quicker I’ll be finished.

“I just wanted it over at that stage. And yeah… the ability to be able to do that, I have to be thankful for that gift that I was given.”

Post-London, she found she was thrust into the spotlight on a scale she hadn’t experienced before.

“Yeah, I did and I didn’t like that part of it, for sure. It’s all a blur to me. I was back in Coronea (National School) and they have a picture when I visited the school a couple of weeks after the race and I don’t remember that. Joe Doonan was there as well and I told him and he said ‘you came to our school (Carrigallen) as well’ and I don’t remember that either.

“A lot of it is a blur for some reason. I wouldn’t remember cities we were in or very much about it. You’re just thinking of the next and the next and the next...”

The return to Coronea was a gorgeous morning, back among her old neighbours, the classroom filled with warmth and affection.

“It was lovely. Most of the parents were there and the grandparents were there. There’s only 16 in the school. Very well-mannered children, they sang and they danced and they had nice questions. One of the little boys wrote a really, really good poem, he has a bit of talent and I was telling him to keep working at that.

“It was special, I didn’t expect it to be such a big occasion, I thought I was only going meeting the children but a lot of the neighbours were there as well and it was lovely. Fair play to them. I did get an opportunity to thank them because when things got tough in a race and when I got very, very tired, they were the ones I would think of.

“I had them in my mind, I wanted to make them happy and they would have driven me to the finish line.”

She doesn’t run as often any more but she keeps active, starting each day with a walk where possible. She teaches running classes, stays fit. “The most important thing is to be healthy,” she says.

Motivational teaching, working with athletes and teams, gives her most enjoyment now.

“I’ve been reading a lot on it. It’s something I want to do in the future. It’s something that excites me and it’s something I feel I can be helpful with and have input in, especially when you experience it yourself.

“To pass on to somebody else your own experiences... I can associate with sportspeople and know what they’re going through. How to prepare for events, physically and mentally. It’s something that I’m excited about and hopefully I can be good at it and can help people, that’s what I’d like to do."