Jessica Ennis-Hill says winning heptathlon gold was a big surprise
Monday 24 August 2015 15:56, UK
Double world heptathlon champion Jessica Ennis-Hill has told Sky Sports News HQ that taking a gold medal in Beijing on Sunday was a big surprise.
The London Olympic champion completed an amazing return to form to win in China, 13 months after the birth of her son Reggie
Ennis-Hill finished ahead of Canada's Brianne Theisen-Eaton, who took silver. Latvia's Laura Ikauniece-Admidina won bronze.
"Obviously I'm just so happy I was able to come away from these two days of competition here in Beijing and to have won the gold medal. It wasn't something we had really focussed on," she said.
"This year was a challenging year for both of us and it was just about coming back and getting a qualifying score for Rio and getting back into competition for next year, so to actually be here in Beijing was a huge, huge bonus for us, and to win the gold medal was a big surprise."
So has being a mother made her a different athlete?
"I think you have to be," she said. "I think your life changes so much and things are different when you're a mother, or a father and yeah I see things differently now. I take training in a different light. Everything that comes in this year and next year is a huge bonus and I'm just very happy and content in my life right now."
Ennis-Hill later watched Usain Bolt take gold in the 100 metres. "It was really special to watch him do what he did," she said. "And I think it lifts the mood of athletics which is great, and hopefully my performances have done something similar."
She still has not given up hope of collecting a third gold medal – for a title denied to her by a drug cheat.
The year before her triumph in London, she took the silver medal at the 2011 World Championships in Daegu behind Russia's Tatyana Chernova. But in January, Chernova was banned for two years following the positive retesting of a sample from the 2009 World Championships.
Her results for two years from August 2009 were annulled, but the period of disqualification expired two weeks before Daegu, allowing her to hold on to that gold medal - for now at least. There is pressure on the International Association of Athletics Federations to look again at the result.
"I still want to be world champion for the third time, but I hope to get that medal at some time, whether that's next year or 10 years down the line," she said.
