Supporting the elite

Adele Nicoll

It takes commitment, determination, passion, and energy to become a sports star. For most, the journey to elite level and beyond is gruelling. But what about when you’re juggling two sports?

It’s something that Manchester Met alumna Adelé Nicoll never thought she’d find out, but at 25 years old is doing just that.

Nicoll joined the University to study a masters in Psychology as a shot-putter with dreams of competing in the summer Olympics. When she started posting videos of her training on Instagram over lockdown, no one could have predicted that just 16 months later, she’d be on her way to the WINTER Olympics.

Nicoll’s training videos caught the eye of Mica McNeill, the leading female British bobsleigh pilot, and she was intrigued by her strength, power and speed. McNeill got in touch to ask if she’d ever tried pushing a bobsleigh. Now, Nicoll is a Bobsleigh World Cup silver medallist and was selected as a reserve for the British team at this year’s Winter Olympics in Beijing.

“I had no idea about anything to do with the sport,” said Nicoll.

“But lots of things were getting cancelled for athletics and there were lots of things that I wasn’t able to do due to COVID, but I had the opportunity to give this new sport a go, and I just thought, why not?”

And that decision was vindicated incredibly quickly.

“There’s only one elite female squad and I got selected for that squad just four weeks after ever touching a bobsleigh,”

Nicoll said. “I thought, right, obviously I’ve got a bit of potential in this, I’ll give it 100 per cent and commit to it over the next year.”

After committing to bobsleigh, Nicoll moved back to her hometown in Welshpool.

“Being an athlete is a full-time job, but bobsleigh is an unfunded sport and I’m an unfunded athlete, so I had to leave where I was living in Cardiff and move back to my family home,” she explained.

“It’s been very difficult, but it just shows it’s purely for the passion of the sport and the intrinsic motivation to want to do it for myself.

“I was completing my masters at the time and working too, so it was a juggle, but the University was so supportive. The distance learning aspect allowed me to continue training, while being on the sport scholarship really helped me financially. Being a distance learning student, I wasn’t able to make full use of everything the scholarship has to offer, but there are some really amazing aspects that will really support an athlete’s career.”

But time and finances weren’t the only things that Nicoll had to worry about. To qualify for the legal weight limit of a bobsleigh team, she had to cut 2.5 stones in weight.

She said: “It was very hard, but along the way I actually learnt a lot. I’m now qualified as a nutrition coach and I did my undergraduate degree in sport and exercise science, so tried to expand that knowledge even more and got myself into really good shape with a lot of help along the way from different people.”

And it was all worth it. In January 2022, Nicoll won a silver medal in the Bobsleigh World Cup – the first medal for a British female bobsleigh team in 13 years. “To be a part of the team was amazing,”

Nicoll said. “I think that winning the medal made a bit of a stance for coming into the sport and being like, this is what I’m here to do, this is what I can do, and this is what I want to consistently do now.”

After an impressive performance at the World Cup, Nicoll was pipped by teammate Montel Douglas to compete at the Winter Olympics. Nicoll attended as a reserve in the team but is now as determined as ever to not be the reserve next time.

“To go from not knowing what the sport was 16 months ago to now being on the Olympic squad is quite surreal,” she said.

“If 16 months ago someone told me I was going to the Olympic Games – I’ve got to learn a whole new sport, lose two and a half stone, get myself into bobsleigh specific shape – it would have seemed too much.

“It was a bittersweet moment not being selected to race at the Olympics because Montel is now a three-time Olympian – she went to the Summer 2008 games as a 100 metre runner, she was the reserve at the last Winter Olympics in 2018, and now she’s finally getting to race at the 2022 Winter Olympics. So hopefully I follow in her footsteps and I have many more Olympics to come.”

Nicoll is now hoping to continue a 2022 to remember.

Only a few weeks after arriving home from Beijing, she returned to the shot-put, competing in the UK Athletics Indoor Championships, bagging a bronze medal and achieving her own personal best in the event.

Now, Nicoll is looking ahead to the Commonwealth Games this year, and then further ahead to the next Summer and Winter Olympics.

“I would not be able to choose one sport,” she said. “I really love them both and what both bring. Before I retire, I would absolutely love to be a summer and winter Olympian. I do believe that I can do both.”

Lauren Hemp

As Lauren Hemp sits down in her Manchester City training kit to talk to Met Magazine, it’s hard to believe that growing up, she was never interested in football.

Hemp was a sporty child, excelling at cricket, but it wasn’t until she got fed up with sitting on the sideline watching her older sister play football that she took inspiration and decided to give it a go. Now, 21-year-old Hemp is playing in a side with some of the best footballers in the game. She started out playing on a local boys’ team in her hometown of Norwich where she quickly developed her passion for the sport.

She then went on to join Norwich City’s youth team, but it folded when she was 15. After a short spell back playing in the local boys’ team, the 16-year-old Hemp packed her bags to leave home and pursue the dream further at Bristol City. Then in 2018 she made the even bigger move to Manchester.

“Moving out at 16 helped a lot with my independence and confidence but to move to Manchester was something else,” she said.

“I was still so young but was about to go and play among some world-class players like Steph Houghton and Ellen White, who I’ve looked up to for so long.”

Hemp soon settled with the club and in her first season, fulfilled every young player’s dream – scoring the final goal to secure the Blues’ FA Cup win at Wembley.

Now she is an established England international with 19 caps and six goals – four of them in one game against Latvia – to her name.

Shortly after joining City, Hemp started at Manchester Met, studying Sport Coaching and Development. She took the distance learning route to allow for her extremely demanding dual career of sport and academia.

“I was spending so much time training and I wanted something else to keep my mind ticking along,” said Hemp.

“I’ve always wanted to go into coaching, and when my football career eventually ends, I hope to go down that route.

“I’d spoken to others who had done the course and they were really positive about it. Being able to study via a distance learning route was really important and it’s worked out perfectly for me. It gave me the chance to train and study without having to physically attend lectures, and when schedules changed, it didn’t affect my learning.

“It can be tricky because you’re going at your own pace, you don’t necessarily know where you’re up to compared to others, but I kept in communication with people on the course, and tutors were so supportive.

“I think going to university and having a degree leads you to many different avenues. It keeps options open for me to go on and do whatever I want. I’m really looking forward to the future, and I can’t thank Manchester Met enough for all that they’ve done for me.”

Hemp finished her degree in 2021 and in the same year her football career hit new heights. Hemp travelled to Beijing to compete for Great Britain at the Olympic Games – her first major tournament at senior level.

“It was pretty unbelievable,” she explained.

“Obviously still being so young and part of that squad, it was just an amazing experience. There were still a lot of COVID restrictions which felt frustrating at the time, but looking back, it was still an unforgettable experience, and it just spurs me on to want to be in tournaments like that in the future.”

The winger has been named PFA Women’s Young Player of the Year three times and dubbed as one of the ten most promising young players in Europe by UEFA.

But when talking through her achievements and acknowledging that she herself is now a football star in her own right, she remains humble.

“People keep telling me that, and I still don’t really believe it yet,” she said. “I’m still so young and there are many people that I still look up to, so to think that I’m a role model for younger people is obviously great, but it still feels pretty surreal.

“So many people paved the way for me, so it’s important for me to do that for the younger girls and boys who want to become professional footballers.”

But her modesty doesn’t come at the cost of the ambition and the winning mentality that will continue to take her far. She has her eyes on collecting more silverware both with club (City have already won the League Cup this season) and country – and establishing her name on the world stage.

“I just want to push for as many trophies as possible this season. We’ve also got the Euros coming up in the summer, which I really hope to be a part of.

“I know it’s a big comment but I’d love to be one of the best players in the world one day – that’s a dream of mine. I’ve always wanted to be the best at anything I do. I play alongside some fantastic players every day, so hopefully in the future that might be possible.”

Dan Clark

At six feet, 11 inches tall, some might say that Dan Clark was made for the basketball court.

Growing up in a family heavily involved in the sport, it’s no surprise that at only 13 years old, Clark was scouted by a number of European clubs and by the age of 14 was on his way to Madrid to start his sports career.

And at 17 years old, Clark made his professional debut in the Liga ACB – Spain’s top division, considered the best domestic league in the world outside of the NBA.

“My mum and dad were both heavily involved in the game, so I was always around it as a youngster,” Clark explained.

“Physically, I always stood out because I was tall and with being around the game for so long, my skills were quite developed at a young age. I was regularly playing for the junior national teams and was invited on some camps around Europe, so I was always in the eye of scouts. I had a number of options to choose from and in the end I thought going to Spain was the best opportunity for me.”

Clark spent 16 years in Spain, fully embracing the Spanish culture, becoming fluent in the language and playing for various teams all across the country.

But despite moving his life to Spain, the power forward still made time to compete for his home nation. Clark made his way through the youth system for Great Britain and made his senior debut in 2009.

Since then, Clark has become team captain, made more than 100 appearances and gained the impressive title of all-time leading points scorer for Great Britain. He has also played against some of the legends of the game, including Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Kevin Durant. But the highlight of his career was qualifying for the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

“A lot of hard work went into making it onto the team,” he said.

“And being able to play in my backyard is even better – it was only about ten or 15 minutes from my home in Stratford.

“As British basketball players, playing in Spain, we don’t get to play many games in front of our friends and family and home fans, so it was a really great experience. The arena was jam packed every day and we got to play against some great teams and some great players.”

Last year, at 32 years old Clark made the big decision to come back to the UK, and for the first time in his professional career, play in the British Basketball League (BBL).

Drawn in by Manchester’s passion for sport, Clark signed for the Manchester Giants, and already, less than a year into his signing, has made an impression with the team reaching the BBL cup final for the first time in 20 years.

But returning home wasn’t just about playing basketball. Clark is keen to make a change and make basketball more visible in the UK.

“I’ve thought about coming back to the UK for a few years now,” he explained.

“I really want the chance to play in front of friends and family, which I haven’t really throughout my career but a big goal of mine is to really push basketball in this country and help it grow as much as possible.

“Basketball is not very accessible to play a good level in the UK – it’s way behind football, rugby or cricket, whereas in the rest of the world it’s huge. It’s the second biggest team sport in the world, so I don’t really know why it’s never kicked off in this country, but I’m keen to change that.”

To give himself the best chance to succeed in his goals, Clark joined Manchester Met as a Sports Scholar to study a Masters in Sport Business, Management and Policy.

“I was very keen on getting back into studying and upskilling and preparing myself for life after sport,” he said.

“I actually think it’s something that’s not talked about enough – the fact that sport doesn’t last forever and when your competitive career eventually comes to an end, you’ve still got another 30 to 40 years to work and make a living.

“I haven’t studied for 15 years, so it’s been really challenging, but I think what I’m doing at Manchester Met is really helping me develop skills that can benefit the club and basketball in the future.

“Doing a degree has opened my eyes to the fact that there are a lot more pathways you can go down in sport, not just as a player. You see the coaches, you see the management team, but you don’t see all the other areas, and some of them are really interesting. So, before starting the masters, I would have said I’d like to do something around managing a team but now it could go a number of ways. That’s something I’ve got to work out.”