BBC brings us the raw emotion behind sport

Jessica Ennis - Olympic heptathlete champion and runner-up BBC SPOTY

Cyclist Bradley Wiggins won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year last night with Olympic heptathlete Jessica Ennis in second place in an emotional celebration of all that's good in sport.

There were tears, laughter and so many, many memories. And as Martina Navratilova said the great success of women athletes in 2012 gives other women 'the possibility to dream'. From the joy of paralympic swimmer Ellis Simmonds to the sheer grit of rower Katherine Grainger, we saw how women could be portrayed in a different world. 

But for me the most inspiring story took place far from the medal ceremonies. Martine Wright lost both her legs in the London bombings in July 2007 but competed in the Paralympics on the sitting volleyball team. She said how lucky she was to have this opportunity, and even that she was on the train to create that chance. Almost unbearably moving. The Beeb recognised her bravery with the Helen Rollason award. 

If you didn't get a chance to watch it all  - and there was three hours of mayhem  - the BBC report is here.

Running for Life after a Kidney Transplant

This article on Transplants and Sport first appeared in the FIT magazine of the Irish Independent.


Transplant success Fit Mag Irish Independent NGriffin Transplant Success (2nd pg) Fit Mag Irish Independent n Griffin

Running for Life after a Kidney Transplant

This article on Transplants and Sport first appeared in the FIT magazine of the Irish Independent.


Transplant success Fit Mag Irish Independent NGriffin Transplant Success (2nd pg) Fit Mag Irish Independent n Griffin

Running for Life after a Kidney Transplant

This article on Transplants and Sport first appeared in the FIT magazine of the Irish Independent.


Transplant success Fit Mag Irish Independent NGriffin Transplant Success (2nd pg) Fit Mag Irish Independent n Griffin

Liz Kavanagh does 12 marathons in 12 months for 2012

Liz Kavanagh might never win a marathon but the 56-year-old with 27 marathons on three continents behind her says getting over the line is the goal. And this year she is hitting that tape 12 times, seven down and five to go. 

She trains in the grounds of Kilkenny Castle, one lap is five km, then press repeat. Kavanagh jogs here and mixes jogging with walking for the races.

Watching her stride through the grounds quickly disabuses you of the thought walking is somehow easier. Colourful trainers hit the ground quickly, arms swing and she’s full steam ahead.

“It’s 26 miles whether you are walking or running. I’d be jogging for about the first half, then walking and jogging. This is my passion, I’m competing against myself so I’m not against anyone,” Kavanagh says.

She jokes she has no ambition to beat Paula Radcliffe and mentions how grateful she is not to have arthritis quite a few times as she talks.

“I have had problems at the end of a race. My feet get very sore. I don’t know if it is arthritis or what, I don’t really want to know what it’s about,” she says. “I don’t want to be told to finish running.”

New York

And while she no longer trains with a club, Kavanagh has enough regular marathons on her list to have made a kind of running family. She first went to New York for the 1999 race and has been back nine times fundraising for the Children’s Hospital in Crumlin.

She says “it’s a great buzz” getting advice from the likes of Eamon Coughlan when the fund-raising  compete.

“And one year when I was about six miles in, I heard that Paula Radcliffe has just won the women’s race, it’s brilliant knowing you are on the same route as someone like that,” Kavanagh says, dismissing any suggestion she herself might be an inspiration to anyone.

Dublin is another favourite route with six clocked up already, and one more planned as part of her 12 marathons in 12 months for 2012 campaign.

Choosing the races for this year was difficult. Kavanagh says she didn’t want to spend a lot of money on long flights – joking she doesn’t have it anyhow – and also wanted to run close to home for her family and friends.

Sitting inside for coffee, she perches lightly on the edge of the sofa and talks excitedly about the possibilities, the events she could have picked.

12 in 12 in 12

Finding a marathon to run in January and February was difficult Kavanagh says, as her budget meant running mostly in Europe.

So like many Irish people in January, she headed for the Canary Islands. But unlike most people, she ran two laps of Las Palmas with 472 other marathoners.

She says with a grin she hadn’t gone there to win, but finishing with a police escort for the final lap hadn’t been on the plan either.

“I finished it and I was last. I got more cheering than the winners, and I wasn’t even mortified,” she says.

In February she sensibly stayed indoors, and convinced her local leisure centre at the Kilkenny Hotel to set up two treadmills. One for her, and one for anyone who wanted to join in.

Kavanagh’s 82-year-old father was one. She did leave a toe-nail behind after over five hours on the treadmill, just like “a real athlete” she says.

The March marathon in Rome started off well, when she joined with the five and half hour pacer and setting off in a chatty group of runners. Maybe too chatty, she says ruefully, showing off a raised bump on her upper lip.

Turns out multi-tasking – running, talking and sight-seeing – doesn’t always work. She took a tumble at the Circo Massimo and finished the race with blood and tissue all over her face. But she did finish, leaving 131 runners trailing behind her … out of 12,679.

April was London and a jog with a 101 year-old-man, Fauja Singh, who has been described as the oldest marathon runner ever.

“He started running when he was 85, and he’s only a small man too. It’s clearly better than sitting on the couch and getting obese,” she says. She managed to overtake him.

Finishing in just under six hours, her Facebook page lists runners who passed her including rhinos, a Big Ben and a jar of marmite.

May’s marathon in Belfast doesn’t get quite the same glowing review.

“That was horrible, it didn’t stop raining the whole marathon. I didn’t enjoy it one bit,” she says, shuddering just a little. And that is all she has to say about six hours of misery.

A month later Kavanagh packed her bra and headed for The Moonwalk in Edinburgh – walking marathon distance under starter’s orders at midnight with everyone wearing pink Breast-Cancer-awareness bras. Boys too.

“They give you a bra and T-shirt but then the heavens opened up. So everyone got a cape too, I had the cape and a hat. People were just going hell-for-leather through the streets with people coming out from the pubs to cheer us on,” she says.

She subconsciously rubs her arms as she remembers hitting 4am and being tired, really tired and cold with only clouds for company.

UltraMarathon South Africa

Perhaps knowing she had done something much harder kept her going. In 2006 Kavanagh and a few friends ran The Two Oceans Ultra Marathon. That’s a small matter of 56 kms (35 miles) around Haut Bay and a few hills in Capetown.

“It was beautiful, and I was able to look around, I was going that slowly. It was really good. I enjoyed that one, no rain there,” she says.

“I was last into the stadium, it was a great buzz. The others were waiting on the track, holding the Irish flag for me. I crossed the line wrapped in the flag. That was the month I turned 50,” she says.

She tells the story like it’s no big deal, like anyone could do it except, of course, they don’t.

Finishing her coffee, she talks again about the buzz of planning marathons. You might think doing 12 this year would dampen her enthusiasm.

But as she lights up talking about the North Pole race, you know she’ll be wearing a groove in the castle gardens for some time yet. 

This piece originally appeared in the Irish Independent's FitMag.

It's Pure Magic kiting over the waves

Every now and then I get to mix work with sport. I have a piece in this week's FIT magazine about kite-surfing, and spoke to Catherine Etienne, one of the few female riders in Ireland. That's Etienne in the pic below, with her part of the article underneath that again. 

And this is what I learned from her: 

On Dollymount Strand in Dublin, Frenchwoman Catherine Etienne explains the kite has to be at 12’clock on that semi-circle shape when you start. The kite hangs there – parked as Roche says – and only picks up power when you drop it down. Into the ‘power zone’, obviously.

The next lesson is just called ‘body-dragging’. Etienne says the key to having fun here is keeping warm.

“There are different thickness of wetsuit but generally people wear the 5mm all year round and in the winter add a neoprene vest underneath. In the summer the water can be quite warm so when it’s eight degrees like now, you don’t feel the cold as much as you think in the water,” she says.

Eight degrees – yes, welcome to an Irish summer. But she says the wind always blows and that’s what counts.

Etienne came to Ireland on Erasmus six years ago but fell in love with the winds on Dollymount and never left.

“It’s probably not the image of the Caribbean but it’s actually the perfect spot. Flat water, shallow water, good wind all year round and a very good community,’ she says, in the Pure Magic shop which doubles up as a meeting-place for Dublin’s riders and wanna-be riders.

One of the sports unwritten commandments is talking to other riders to find out about wind currents or water hazards. This gives a real communal feel to the sport says Etienne.

The third lesson is when you get introduced to the board. And this is where it gets fun.

Yes, lots of fun but lots of hard work too. Holding the kite upright requires solid core-strength, instructors tell you to relax your shoulders so the power comes from your core.

Your legs are working as hard as on a surf-board to stay balanced while your arms are at full-stretch against the wind. But don’t rush to the gym to load up on weights as Mother Nature expects high levels of flexibility.

And like most sports, the more you do the more you will build up the physical skills you need. Swimming is pretty important for beginners as you do spend a lot of time rescuing the kite and starting over … and over and over. 

Find out more about Pure Magic here. 

Time to try a triathlon says Carolyn Hewett

So let’s get this straight. The Big Daddy Ironwoman means a marathon, biking for 180 km and swimming 3.8km. Olympic distance is a ten km run, 40km on the bike and 1.5km in the water. But a sprint is just an hour of five km running, 20 km on the bike and a 750m swim. Are you with me? 

So the trick is to know who you are – a Big Daddy, an Olympian or a sprinter says Australian triathlete Carolyn Hewett.


Most people start small, maybe with a ten km run or a bit of a swim. Not Hewett. She decided doing a full Ironwoman would be the best way to find out what works for her.  Before reading on, you should probably know her training was part of recovery from viral meningitis and post chronic viral fatigue. As you do.

Readers, she won.

“I jumped in with both feet. The illness was definitely part of it, I wanted to do an Ironwoman before I turned 30 and it helped with my recovery too,” she says.

Speaking on Skype from her office in London – she works full-time with O2 in the UK – Hewett explains her illness had left her unable to make up a flight of stairs without a break. Doctors told her to just be glad she was alive and forget about ever doing sport again.

“For the first few months I had to sleep after I did anything. It took some time but I eventually managed to run for 30 seconds and walk for 4.5mins and do that four times. The effort put me in bed for a week. I tried again a month later and was bed ridden for 3 days which I saw as progress,” she says.

Hewett used to run a lot before she got ill, but had to learn how to swim properly and how to bike at speed. And having won her first Ironwoman, she had to add in some media training.

Listening to her now, you can see how the treadmill got going – ill woman wins first Ironwoman, and becomes instant star …but how do you prepare for that?

Winning an Ironwoman means you can then compete in the World Championships. Most people build up to this from the start of their season – as Hewett herself does now – but back then she just kept going and going.

“I won and that was great, but then there was six weeks between the race and the World Championships. I was approached by Channel 4 who wanted to follow someone and they came with me to Hawaii. They flew with me, so that was a huge added pressure.

“The race took me eleven hours, it was incredibly tough. I ended up in hospital with a camera in my face … suffering with dehydration, exhaustion. It was just brutal.”

She did two more Ironwoman events, but found herself training 23 hours a week on top of her job and seeing exhaustion looming.

So Hewett ‘dropped’ back to the Olympic distance.

These days, she’s a familiar face on the circuit everywhere in the world – one of the few amateurs competing with the big boys and girls.

“I’ve had a couple of illness dips that lay me out for a week. I go to bed and build up again,” she says. “Everytime I get a headache I freak out a little - that fear of being ill has never left me.”

Sponsored by bike company Wiggle, Hewett competes most weekends. Today she’s in Spain at the Thomas Cook Ironman 70.3 Mallorca.

She says sponsorship makes a huge difference in this sport, that a good bike can make you seconds faster and place up that bit further up the field.

And it seems to be working. Hewett’s been London Triathlon age group champion for the past three years as well as winning the Blenheim triathlon, the Women's Only Triathlon twice and winning and placing in more than 20 other races.

One of her favourite events she says is the ‘Castle Triathlon Series’ with bike-to-run changeovers taking place in medieval courtyards.

Hewett jokes she’s not particularly good at any one event but somehow when she swims, bikes and runs together, it all works.

“I think I would get bored if I went back to just one sport. Mixing it up is a way of alleviating the pressure. I can train twice a day, no way could I do that with just one sport,” she says.

And we’ll leave it there for today. Hewett will be back here next week with tips on how to get through a triathlon in one piece. 

(updated on May 18th with links to Hewett's Wiggle blog) 

Wordless Wednesday

pic: Telegraph

pic: Yahoo sport

pic: Metro

A few words today:
Englishwoman Claire Lomas was paralysed from the chest down in 2007 following a horse-riding accident. These pics are from the London Marathon, which she completed yesterday in a 'bionic suit' ... 16 days after the winner.

Other Wordless Wednesday bloggers hanging out here.

Death of Kenyan rugby player

Aberdeen Skikoyi

Captain of the Kenyan women's rugby team Aberdeen Shikoyi has died as a result of injuries she received during a game last weekend.

Reports from the match against Uganda say she was hit in the spine during a tackle  - kneed - and then hurt again during a scramble for the ball just after that, some stories saying another player then stepped on her neck.

A statement from the Kenya Rugby Union said: "The KRU confirms the death of Aberdeen Shikoyi. We and the entire rugby fraternity are thankful for her service, dedication and leadership offered to the game of rugby and is saddened by her passing on. We also pay tribute to Uganda Rugby Union and the medical teams in Uganda and Kenya who ensured that she received the best medical treatment possible."

We all love rugby and other contact sports because there is that risk of danger, that edge to playing the game but it's always tragic when someone crosses that line. It can so easily happen. I know many people with almost-serious-injuries and some who have died doing what they loved, and you probably do too.

Joanne Cuddihy has her eye on London 2012

pic Athletics Ireland

UPDATE: Cuddihy ran 51.54 to dip under the qualifying A-standard on May 3rd and joins the London-bound team.

400 metres isn’t very long but to get to the starting blocks in London 2012 Irishwoman Joanne Cuddihy has gone all the way to Canberra, Australia. And a few stops like Japan, Europe and America in-between.

“It’s not all glamourous, you do get jet-lag,” she says over Skype. “You have to put most normal stuff on hold and you live a hermit’s life.”

But as she talks you realise Cuddihy thinks the sacrifices -  leaving family and boyfriend in Ireland, putting her medical training on hold – are more than worth it.

She says she loves the big events – the World Championships, the Europeans, but she’s also four times Irish champion at 400m with a Personal Best of 50.73. And this month took the Australian National Championships title in a time of 51.69 as well as running with the successful Irish 4 x400 metres relay team.

Training Schedule

But all those titles come at a price. Her typical training week with the Australian Institute of Sport would leave most people behind on the track.

Cuddihy says: “AIS is class. I’ve trained in the UK and North America. I definitely think this is the best, the coaching facilities and whole set-up are perfect. It’s quite relaxed too, Australians do that very well – intense but laid-back.”

Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday – at the gym

Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday – Cardio, jogging, core work

She lists out some of the work they do on the track - lactic tolerance work meaning long runs with very little recovery time. And then speedwork, other technical work like dragging sleds or pulling a harness with weights. They do hurdle-drills and short, fast races over short distances at a high intensity.

Are you keeping up?

There’s more. Running at race-pace over longer reps but quickly and closer to the 400m distance. Sometimes extra lactic work or speed work. And when that takes its toll, down to the pool for aqua-aerobic sessions. 

Not to mention keeping her mental focus after a false start at the World Championships last year saw her knocked out of the 400m. She rushes over that as we talk, moving onto the exciting relay result from the same event. 

Team-time 

Because it's not all ‘alone on the track’ stuff. The tall athlete is very proud of the Irish relay team, points out they are ranked 12th in the world with a great chance of qualifying for the Olympics.

“Our relay team is really exciting. I love being on the team, love the relays. We smashed the (Irish) National Record in Korea last year at 3.37m.”

Pic Zimbio

Relay qualifications are based on two races, so with that one in the bag they are aiming for another good time to confirm their place.

Funding a racing lifestyle

Like many elite Irish athletes Cuddihy is funded by the Irish Sports Council. But €12,000 doesn’t go far when a flight to Australia from Ireland can be almost €1,000.

This is where Cuddihy’s story gets interesting – she casually says she’s training to be a doctor to pay those bills.

She’s been mixing medicine and running since her student days in University College Dublin. Well-known for its sports programmes, she says the college helped plan her twin-careers.

“At the first Sports Scholarship meeting we talked about how to juggle both. Medicine gets trickier when you’re in fourth year and you have to be out and about doing internships,” Cuddihy explains.

“I did one year at a hospital, then took a gap year. Then I did my finals after Beijing.” That would be the 2008 Olympics.

She spread her internship over 18 months instead of 12 including time in Australia and back in Galway, something she describes with a grin as slightly unorthodox.

The flip side is falling behind women who can afford to train full-time thanks to government funding or full sponsorship. So Cuddihy’s time now in Australia is all about recovering from a niggling back injury and cracking the A-standard before the London Games.

“I’m still studying here, it can be tricky with the visa too so study is the best option. You can’t have big blanks in your CV applying for (medical) jobs. But I was far behind with training, you have to catch up,” she says.

She jokes that Canberra – as one of the few Australian cities without a beach – is the perfect place for focused training. Maybe it helps her boyfriend has returned to Ireland for his own medical training.

And younger sister Catriona was also at the Australian National Championships. Piling on the sibling rivalry she came 8th in the 400 m with a PB of 55.03.

What’s next?

Training, training and study. Cuddihy says everything between now and July is a step towards peaking on the track in London.

pic: Zimbio

“My plan is to fun faster than the A-standard by the London Olympics. 

In my event, you know you just have to run as fast as you can when you line-up.”

Bumps, bruises and rugby with Dani Bachmann

From au-pair to rugby player Dani Bachmann has had an eventful decade living in Ireland. I was watching a men's game a few weeks ago when she was pointed out as 'someone you should talk to for that blog.' So here she is ... 

Dani with her team (back row, 3rd from right)

So for anyone wondering just how much contact is involved in a contact-sport like rugby, Dani’s injuries tell a good story – broken nose nine times, one black eye so nasty that passers-by on her university campus suggested she dump him now and bumps and bruises too many too count. She’s been playing for four years but says the damage “hasn’t stopped me.”

Having moved to Ireland as an au-pair from her home near Frankfurt in Germany, she initially continued playing the lacrosse she'd played at home. That’s not exactly a gentle game but far from the pressure of a scrum. “I was playing away, but it didn’t click with me. There was a bit missing,” she says. “A friend said to try rugby, as a joke really. I wasn’t sure but then decided to give it a go.”

This coincided with going to university as a mature student at University College Dublin. So with college as the traditional place to start something new, Dani signed up with the team. Lots of other ‘newbies’ around gave her the confidence to get out on the pitch, and with the encouragement of her coach she found herself taking part in her first game days after the first training session.

“Women’s teams are always short of people. So I spent 45 minutes running around, not knowing what I was doing, just following the ball really,” she says. “It was fantastic, and the team was brilliant to be with.”

Thinking about it now, she says the physicality (this is a word you hear a lot when rugby players talk sport) brings the players closer together than in other sports she’s played. With the ball moving at speed between the 15 players, and potentially serious injuries never more than a mis-step away, she says it’s not for everyone.

“I think that people would have an image of a women’s rugby player would be of a big girl and all that so that if you say you are a rugby player, you are openly admitting to be a bit of an outsider, to being a bit odd. So when you show up and meet the other 14 women who also love rugby and they think like you think, it’s brilliant.”

Dani (extreme left in blue stripes) looking for the  ball

She played with the college team for a year, and then switched to club team Blackrock about three years ago, where she togs out as second row backrow. On a year out from matches to complete a Masters in Human Rights, she’s already counting down to the pre-season training in July.

And she’s no stranger to local passions - now a staunch Leinster fan, Dani jokes that she only watches rivals Munster when they’re not playing her home team.

She says: “It’s hard to explain, but I just found the sport that suits me to a tee.” 

If you have any rugby questions, leave them here for Dani!

Women in sport talk new year's resolutions

I just heard a medical expert on the radio here in Dublin telling us that giving up alcohol or ...(fill in with your choice of vice) for one month isn't enough - you need to change your approach during the whole year. Well, duh! Now if only it were as easy to do as to say. Thanks mainly to the power of Twitter, here's what some of women in sport are planning for 2012.

Surfer Claire Bevilacqua says her mission for 2012 is to "encourage and inspire" starting with teaching her 9 year old niece to surf. 

Wombat Sports: Lots of ambitions for women's MMA here, they plan to re-organise the weight divisions and bring European + Japanese fighters to train in the US. More plans here.

Like so many Olympic athletes swimmer Femke Heemskerk is looking to the Olympics saying it's her dream and "go for it, never surrender" is her message to other hopefuls.

Snowboarder Tara Dakides left this slightly crptic thought for us: "When changes come I close my eyes and see a door. A door that opens to another world another chapter and chance 2 grow n discover greatness." 

Women Talk Sports:  Over on one of my favourite sites, Rebecca says "ditch the dieting". 

Boxer Laila Ali looks like she's planning a nutrition overhaul with lots of links to Healthy Eating sites. 

Cyclist Deborah Atkinson lays out her plans on Snowcatcher to keep up the 60-mile bike-ride. (96.5km)

Katarzylna at A Runner's Life is planning big changes to her running and fitness routine - summed up as "Train harder and smarter. In 2012 I need to be more systematic." Details here. 

Surfer Stephanie Gilmore: "Christmas is about celebrating the year past with the ones you love, but it can drag on to a few days of over-indulging, so I try to pace myself, and make sure the day is full of physical activities so I can enjoy myself – eat like a king and then dance it all off!"  from Body and Soul 

I loved snowboarder Helene Olafson's wish - "May the new year bring you all sparks!!" with a link to this gorgeous photo

And me? If you've been following for a while, you know I'm on a long-term mission to get fit again having had some nasty stuff happen about 2 years ago. So the small steps continue! What about you - what are your healthy resolutions for 2012?

Post-conflict recovery through sport

This is another inspiring short from Women Win looking at different ways women find to recover from trauma suffered during conflict. It might sound a bit facetious to say sport can heal those kinds of scars but watching this, you see it can at least help women to find somewhere to forget for a moment. I'm going to a conference on Gender Based Violence in Dublin today, so seemed an appropriate day to find this film.  


I posted on another Women Win project here.

Musical Yoga in Sydney

Sarah Trestrail

When someone says yoga helped her recover from fracturing five lumbar vertebrates in a horse riding accident, you have to think there's something to all this talk of healing and flexibility. Sarah Trestrail is one of only five Jivamukti Yoga teachers in Australia which means ...

When I interviewed her in Sydney she explained the secret to this type of yoga is in the tunes. "We use a lot of music as a feature in class; all styles with rock or jazz. It’ll have a philosophical theme for the class, the teacher works with the theme and sequences the class according to the theme. The teacher might be sitting there with a guitar leading a chant  or playing the harmonium. It's good fun." 

A former fitness instructor, she was taken to a yoga class when the pain from her healing back prevented her from working. And now she's "addicted".

But loving yoga is about more than flexing a few moves. 

Sarah said it's all about losing that fear of re-hurting yourself or aggravating an old injury. 

"The first time you do a headstand, it's like Oh my god, I just did my first head stand, I can do anything. It's amazing, you can do things you never thought you would do." 

Arthritis and adventure racing

Hip replacements and arthritis are things we usually associate with older people, people in their 60s maybe. But not always. American adventure racer Robyn Benincasa was diagnosed with osteoarthritis at 41. 

Robyn from Project Athena Foundation

Robyn says on her website she was taking part in the World Championships in 2007 when it all came to a head. "I was in so much pain that I took one final step and fell to the ground on the fifth day of the race, the day that my team was climbing the biggest peak in the country, Ben Nevis. My teammates took all of my gear and put me on a tow line. Often during the last thirty-six hours of that race, I had to physically pick up my leg and move it forward because it would no longer respond to signals from my brain." 

I'm sure lots of you reading have felt as if you were throwing a leg up the mountain from time to time but this was something else. With 15 years of adventure racing  - if you don't know, they're the people that run, bike, kayak or climb for days over mountains, through rivers or caves and well over whatever is in the way - behind her Robyn was not someone you'd expect to be told both hips were disintegrating.

And this is where the story moves behind the usual athlete-gets-injured and overcomes. Obviously osteoarthritis isn't a death knell but it can be next to that for many people. 

After two gruesome sounding operations involving dislocation of a leg by the surgeon, Robyn tried to find, well, find the meaning in the mess. First she started with two friends, who'd had rheumatoid arthritis and breast cancer, organising an adventure race-team. And from there, it grew into a foundation Project Athena that works with women who've been through disease and want to start living again. 

The woman who sent me on the link (thank you Sandy) says it's an "incredible story". We all think when we're sick we will never forget how frustrating it is but usually once we get better, that's it. Illness packed in a box never to be thought of again. But Robyn Benincasa managed to hold onto that even while she started racing again - enough that she is able to get other women on their feet again. 

I had to smile at the final line on her page from her book Team Works: "I guess the moral of the story is that none of this life changing and life affirming stuff would have happened had there been more cartilage in the world." 

Do you know anyone else living with a disease usually associated with older people?