Gillian Cooke is in her hotel room in Cesana, Italy. Snow has piled up so high that she can’t see out of her window. She can’t go out to train, never mind compete in her newfound sport.

In August of last year, Cooke was training as Scotland’s top long jumper in Edinburgh. Now, in January, the 26-year-old from Edinburgh is representing Great Britain in the Bobsleigh World Cup series, with a realistic goal of making the Winter Olympics in 2010

Cooke started off her career in the gym hall. She took up gymnastics at the young age of five and it all grew from there. At school she was blessed with the chance to try an abundance of different sports before she found her speciality. Table tennis, football, rowing, fencing, Cooke participated in as many sports as she could whilst she was growing up.

“I wasn’t particularly good at anything but I just tried everything and school gave me a great opportunity to find out what I was good at.”

It was when she was 17 that a friend from gymnastics asked her to go along to a local athletics club and try her hand at a new sport. However, instead of starting on the track, Cooke joined her friend on the runway of the pole vault.

“I had spatial awareness from being a gymnast so my challenge was learning how to run because I had no real background in that.”

Cooke realised she had a natural ability for the pole vault and she began to get the knack for the sport, setting her sights on the inaugural Commonwealth Youth Games in her hometown of Edinburgh in 2000. However, three months before the Games she found out that the pole vault was not going to feature at the event.

Determined to achieve her goal and participate in the Games, Cooke weighed up her options and decided to give triple jump a try. Progressing in the event over the summer months, she was selected as a triple jumper, representing Scotland at the highest level in her age group.

“I really wanted to go. So I entered the long and triple jump at out club championships and through that summer I just progressed and eventually got selected in the triple jump for that.”

In what was her first major competition in the triple jump, Cooke managed to secure a fourth place finish at the Games. For the next few years, Cooke focused her attentions on triple jump and her favoured pole vault, setting three Scottish pole vault records inside the space of two months.

Her efforts were rewarded in 2002 when she was selected to participate in the Commonwealth Games in Manchester as a pole-vaulter.

Her ability to transfer her sporting talents into a number of events was apparent when she stumbled upon the long jump after failing to enter the Scottish Junior Championships in the pole vault and triple jump. However, her misfortune worked in her favour as she excelled in her first competitive attempt in the long jump.

“I went and did the club championships but all they could offer me was a long jump and I put half a metre onto my best and found out I could actually do that event.”

Since then, Cooke has focused all her efforts on the long jump, gaining GB selection and entering the all-time Scottish long jump record list in third place. In March 2006 she attended her second Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, making the final of the long jump.

Earlier in 2008, Cooke proved her worth at the top of the sport in Scotland by leaping to a 6.43m indoor record.

Cooke’s sporting career has clearly been filled with opportunism, seizing chances and making the most of her talents. The most recent leg of her sports journey has been no different.

Contacted via a social networking website by former long jump rival, Nicola Minichiello, Cooke was invited to a trial to fill the position as brakewoman in the Great Britain bobsleigh team. She describes her selection process as “a bit of a whirlwind”.

Indeed, Cooke impressed the judges so much that she was selected having never set foot on a proper ice track.

“I basically had a half hour session the day before to familiarise myself with running on ice for the first time and then the next day I was into a competitive environment.”

After the selection, Cooke was thrown headfirst into the extreme nature of the sport. She went along with the rest of her team to a training camp at Lake Placid. Having never set foot in a proper bobsled before the event, Cooke’s team-mates were apprehensive as to how she would adjust to the nature of the sport.

“It’s apparently the second hardest track in the world. They were a bit worried as to whether I would like it or not but they reckoned that if I liked it in Lake Placid I’d like it anywhere. I got the bottom on the first run and I was like ‘can I go again?’” She laughed.

And she did. Since her first real taste of a real bobsled run, Cooke has represented Great Britain on the World Cup series on three occasions, helping them towards a 6th place finish in the third race on the circuit in Austria last month. She sounds ambitious and quietly confident in a completely new sport she took up only 6 months ago.

Her short-term goal is to achieve success on the track where it all began. The World Championships will be held in February in Lake Placid, the track Cooke experienced her primary plummet in a bobsled.

“Our aim is to medal in Lake Placid in February. We’re hoping to get as many top 6 finishes as we can in the World Cup so we’re doing well in our first one this week so it’s all looking positive.”

After that race, Cooke will return to training as one of Scotland’s top long jumpers through the summer season. She plans to live a multi-sport lifestyle for the next few years, long jump in the summer and bobsled through the winter.

However, her mind is set on one specific target, to fulfil her ultimate ambition by winning an Olympic medal. Next year’s Winter Olympics is the target and she has the belief in herself and the team around her that she will be able to achieve her goal.

“It is a great team that we’ve got, it’s very focused and Vancouver 2010 is the final aim. It’s a long journey that we’re taking but I think with the people we’ve got there is a really good chance of success.”

IC
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