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A 15-year-old sprinter with cerebral palsy has been taking advantage of the “shorter commute” to school – one metre between her bed and desk – to get better sleep, and ramp up her training.
T35 para sprinter Grace Greenwood, whose condition affects movement and co-ordination, is the current CP Sport under-14 100m record holder and ranked second in the under-17 category by the World International Paralympic Committee.
She took the bronze for Team England in the Cerebral Palsy World Games when she was just 13, and has since represented South West England Schools at National School Games, British Athletics in the International Grand Prix Series.
Pictured: Grace is hoping to take part in the World Junior Games in 2021 and the Commonwealth Games for Jersey in 2022.
She is currently targeting the World Junior Games in 2021 and the Commonwealth Games for Jersey in 2022.
While she would normally be in the competition phase of training at this time of year, lockdown has meant she has had to adapt and be more general in her preparation, with the added bonus of extra sleeping time.
“The lockdown is actually helping my training a little because I no longer have the dreaded early morning starts for school! Now the morning school commute is only from the bed to my desk one metre away, so I get a good amount of quality sleep,” Grace explained.
“With cerebral palsy, tiredness plays a big part in limiting the effectiveness of training so being able to train fully rested makes a massive difference to the quantity of training I can tolerate, though I'd say the technical quality is suffering a little from not being able to access face-to-face the coaches at the Jersey Sport Foundation facility, and particularly my track coach at Spartans.”
Pictured: Grace says she has been training more during lockdown, thanks to being more rested.
Thanks to the extra rest, Grace has been training more than normal, but she still has to recover for at least 24 hours between sessions to ensure she feels fully recharged.
She is therefore training every other day, mixing strength and conditioning with different types of speed work such as acceleration, velocity or endurance.
Thankfully, the teen sprinter says she has a good range of equipment at home, including a S&C kit and a resistance speed trainer.
“It's a brilliant bit of kit which allows me to add variable resistance to runs, so I can now work on my acceleration and speed endurance and only really need 30m to work in,” Grace explained.
She also makes good uses of her garden and the nearby Les Quennevais track.
Pictured: Grace says she uses social media a lot.
Like many other teens, Grace confesses she uses social media a lot. “Keeping in touch that way is normal to me,” she said.
“I still get my weekly track programme from my wonderful coach Karen Le Motte,” she added.
“The Jersey Sport Foundation have an excellent online athlete monitoring programme through which they track not only my weekly physical performance but also my nutrition and general lifestyle, so I feel fully supported.
“They also have an online athlete education portal running throughout the lockdown so I'm building up my own knowledge in areas such as sports psychology.
“In addition, I am lucky to have access to Joe McDonnell, who is a brilliant British paralympic coach, and Jonas, who has a VCoaching option that I'm keen to try where he monitors sessions live from Loughborough.”
Pictured: Grace is being kept busy by her puppy, Woody, and school work.
Aside from her training, Grace keeps busy with schoolwork, dialling into lessons from her teachers at Beaulieu.
“I also have my Cavapoo, Woody, who is just a puppy and he certainly keeps me busy!” she said.
“It's really though just a routine of school, eating well, training and sleep and the lovely Jersey sunshine has certainly been helping!”
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