
Colourblind
Gold the ultimate. Silver a bittersweet success. Bronze the copper coloured confirmation of great effort. Finally nothing. Nada. Nowhere. This weeks guests have dealt with it all
Gold a most precious metal, a treasure and the ultimate medal to win. Silver a shimmering standard of success, just a slither short of the top prize. Bronze, the copper coloured conclusion confirms great effort. Finally nothing. Nada.Nowhere... This week our guests have experienced the emotions of all of the above.
Climber Janja Garnbret is one of the best examples of how easy becoming Olympic champion can look. In both Tokyo and Paris she seemingly effortlessly ascended her way to gold. They sit alongside her EIGHT World Championships. At 26 she's still young enough to continue to dominate for some time. From her home Slovenia, where she is a mega star, she joined Katie Smith to talk about just how much effort goes into making the very difficult look like a walk in the park, what it felt like to become a two time Olympic champion and body image.
Some say silver is "first looser" and there's no doubt a bitter sweet feel to coming second, even if you are considered one of Africa's greatest Olympic sprinter. Sadly for him there no better person to speak about what it feel like to land a silver, he won FOUR Olympic silvers. We hear from for Namibia's Frankie Fredricks on how it felt to never make it to gold.
We meet the Bronze who is a born winner. This bronze is about to set off to defend her gold medal winning performance of four years ago, because this Bronze is England footballer Lucy Bronze. She's part of the England squad looking to defend their Women's Euro title in Switzerland. So if we can't talk to Lucy about what it's like to finish with a bronze (and yes, we know she won bronze in 2015 at the World Cup) we might as well ask her about the secret to her success, and it turns out that is a small dog called Nala!
It seems more than a bit unfair to have our final guest, our guess that fits the theme because it's the "no medal at all" section of the show. Not least because Justin Phongsavanh won Paralympic bronze in the javelin in Tokyo... But with a chance to compete in front of his home crowd at the Games of LA in 2028 his dream appears to have been ripped away from him. Justin has been explaining what has happened and how he's coping. he also tells us about one night in 2015 when his life changed forever.
(PHOTO: Janja Garnbret of Slovenia competes during the women's lead climbing qualification of the Climbing World Cup 2023 in Innsbruck, Austria. CREDIT: Marco Kost/Getty Images)
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Not by the Playbook
Inspirational stories from around the world. Interviews with people defying the odds