Team GB gymnasts Becky and Ellie Downie targeting Olympic Games gold in Tokyo
By Geraint Hughes, Sky Sports News reporter
Last Updated: 05/02/20 7:12am
Nottingham to Tokyo - Sky Sports News' Geraint Hughes meets gymnast sisters Becky and Ellie Downie, who are targeting medal success at the 2020 Olympic Games.
Sporting talent running through a family is a common occurrence. When it comes to the Olympics, the Brownlee brothers, Alistair and Jonny have won two triathlon golds, a silver and a bronze between them at the last two Games.
The Downie sisters are no different and are hoping to follow up their medal successes at last year's Gymnastics World Championships this summer at Tokyo 2020.
Becky (28) won silver in the Uneven Bars at the World and European games in 2019, while Ellie Downie (20) picked up bronze in the Vault at the Worlds and another in the same discipline at the European Games.
The pair are seven-and-a-half years apart in age and specialise in different disciplines within gymnastics, yet both are peaking with individual and team selection for the Tokyo Olympics on the horizon.
Becky has also witnessed vital cultural changes within her sport.
Her experiences, fortunately, do not mirror those of USA superstar Simone Biles who suffered abuse from disgraced US National coach Larry Nasser, but Becky says a culture within gymnastics where the welfare of the athlete was not perhaps as high a priority as it is now.
She said: "The culture of my sport has changed massively since I started. The coaching staff have got better, we have more people on board and it's more about: 'Yes it's a hard and elite sport, but it needs to be fun and enjoyable.'
"I think a lot of that was missed because it was always like 'gymnastics is tough, we're going to be tough on you all the time.' It is tough, it's still tough every day now, but it's a different kind of tough."
Becky also made the point that her sister Ellie at 20 has not experienced the previous ruthless culture Becky was speaking about.
Both though are thriving and both are in contention to medal for Team GB, for their home city of Nottingham and their family at Tokyo, although both acknowledge a realism and pragmatism of their aspirations.
The imperious 22-year-old American gymnast Simone Biles, who boasts a total of 30 Olympic and World Championship medals, is currently blocking their shot at a medal.
Ellie joked: "When you get into a final with her, you know she's going to win! We're all kind of fighting for second and third which is slightly annoying."
Becky's individual specialism is the uneven bars, a weak link for Biles.
She added: "Most pieces Simone does, it's like Usain Bolt in that you know if they do their job they are highly likely to win.
"Whereas with bars, it's probably the only apparatus in women's [gymnastics] which is open to win which is amazing for me as it's my event!"
Witnessing an afternoon session at their gym in Nottingham put firmly into perspective what both sisters physically put their bodies through in the pursuit of Olympic success.
Miraculously, after 20 minutes or so, their muscles, ligament and tendons firing on all cylinders, the sisters contorted their frames in a way television cannot truly convey; their single-minded nature was evident - success at Tokyo 2020.
