'Athletes thrive off the pressure and expectation'

Katharine Merry (l) won bronze in Sydney 2000 as Cathy Freeman took gold and Lorraine Graham of Jamaica won a silver medal in the women's 400m final

Olympic bronze medallist Katharine Merry says she hopes Team GB athletes "thrive off the pressure and expectation" at Paris 2024.

Merry made her debut at Atlanta in 1996, saying she went for the experience aged 21 and did not expect to win anything.

But four years later, in Sydney, she was at the start line of what many people said was the greatest race of those games, coming third in the 400m final, as victorious Cathy Freeman claimed gold.

"What you want as an athlete when you go into an Olympic Games is to be in the form of your life, is to be the fastest in the world, and have that pressure and expectation that you can thrive off," she told Nick Owen on BBC Midlands Today.

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“It’s a real balance of excitement but also nerves, because the Olympics is a bit like Christmas.

“You think you’ve got loads of time… then all of a sudden, 'You’re like, it’s here already?',."

If an athlete is not in the greatest shape then they are likely to be more nervous because they have run out of time, she said.

“So, it is a real balance of excitement, because it is the biggest show on earth, but also a little bit of nerves in there as well."

'Ran my fastest ever time'

Merry said she could remember "every single detail" about the 400m race in Sydney.

“I was very lucky to have lane three in the women’s final.

“It was the biggest race, there was 112,000 people in the stadium - 111,000 supporting Cathy Freeman.

“It’s still one of the most-watched television events ever, and in Australia of course.

“It was amazing. I ran my fastest ever time. I ran under 50 seconds for the first time and I picked up a bronze medal and I look back and think, 'Wow, how did I do that?'.”

Looking ahead to track events in Paris, she said she was rooting for fellow Birchfield Harrier Matt Hudson-Smith, from Wolverhampton, in the men's 400m and tipped him for a gold medal along with Keely Hodgkinson in the women's 800m.

Katharine Merry, who is commentating for BBC 5 Live at the games, told WM she tipped Matthew Hudson-Smith to win gold in the men's 400m

Now president of Birchfield Harriers in Birmingham and an ardent Aston Villa fan, Merry said the excitement of taking part was exhilarating.

“It was really, really exciting," she said. "There’s nothing like getting your Team GB or your British Athletics kit and all the stuff that comes with it."

Although she competed in two Olympic Games, she has never been part of opening ceremonies, because competitor sports take place at different times and she was in a holding camp during Atlanta and Sydney Games.

She said she had "FOMO" [fear of missing out] that she could not take part in the ceremony.

“I’ve always regretted not being able to be part of an opening ceremony, but even if you were fit there’s a lot of athletes that choose not to do it because it is a very, very long process and it’s long in duration, which is quite tiring,” she added.