Latest / Rugby Rivals - Sir John Kirwan & Victor Matfield / Sean Fitzpatrick & Daley Thompson on Winning Without Sacrifice

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Sean Fitzpatrick & Daley Thompson on Winning Without Sacrifice · Rugby Rivals - Sir John Kirwan & Victor Matfield

0:00
I did my first decathlon.
0:02
I'd only done three of the events before, but I'd had four or five weeks training.
0:06
I remember going to bed, I was knackered, and I remember thinking to myself vividly, I'm gonna be really good at this one day.
0:14
The fear of failure.
0:16
What is that?
0:17
It must be in the back of your mind.
0:19
Why?
0:20
Because it's in the back of yours.
0:23
You're probably the most confident man I've ever met.
0:25
Sean, I promise you, I never had a second's doubt that I was going to be the world's greatest athlete.
0:30
You know what?
0:31
I am a really good swimmer.
0:32
I might want to be a swimmer.
0:34
And so I went into a race swimming and they almost had to send the lifeguard in to get me.
0:44
You trained 350 days a year.
0:48
Absolutely.
0:48
On Christmas Day, you trained twice.
0:51
Absolutely, because I knew everybody else wouldn't be.
0:53
Bruce Jenner.
0:54
Absolutely.
0:55
Who you annoyed the hell out, apparently.
0:57
Yeah, that's what she says.
0:59
In Moscow in 1980, that was your first gold medal.
1:03
What did that feel like?
1:04
Honestly, it felt like...
1:12
Today's guest is one of the greatest all-round athletes Britain has ever produced.
1:16
One of the most dominant decathletes in history.
1:19
He grew up in London in the late 1960s and 70s, discovered sport through football, and then somehow ending up mastering 10 different disciplines at an elite level.
1:32
By the late teens, he was already a British champion.
1:36
By his early 20s, he was a Commonwealth champion.
1:39
And by the mid-20s, he was an Olympic champion, not once, but twice, 1980 and 1984.
1:48
Today's guest is Daley Thompson.
1:50
Winning Matters is proudly brought to you by Altrad, Global Leaders in Industrial Services Equipment and Engineered Products.
1:57
This podcast is called Winning Matters, and the people I have on it are serial winners.
2:05
They have a passion for winning, and they're just doing a bit of research on you.
2:10
In terms of the All Blacks, we talk about preparation, the best prepared people win.
2:16
And I think about it, when I was looking at that today, best prepared people win.
2:20
You trained 350 days a year.
2:22
Absolutely.
2:23
Absolutely.
2:25
And what I loved, on Christmas Day, you trained twice.
2:29
Absolutely, because I knew everybody else wouldn't be.
2:31
Okay.
2:32
And I'm thinking back to my days.
2:35
I was petrified.
2:38
You didn't have this.
2:39
I had an imposter syndrome where I didn't think I was good enough.
2:43
So I trained harder than everyone else.
2:47
And I think about you training on Christmas Day.
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Ironically, on Christmas Day, I always trained.
2:52
There you go.
2:53
But that was because of you.
2:54
I didn't train twice.
2:58
So I'm going to look at getting into that, what made you like that.
3:04
You talk about preparation.
3:06
The best pair of people win.
3:08
And you talk about repetitively just doing it.
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You train two hours in the morning, two hours in the afternoon.
3:13
And then you go to the gym in the evening.
3:14
Yeah.
3:16
So you're repeating stuff.
3:17
So the actual competition was easy.
3:20
And for me, it really should be.
3:23
I think the training is hard and it's monotonous and, you know, not all the time, but it can be a bit dull.
3:33
And I think if you don't enjoy what should be the fun bit, which is the competition, then it just makes it doubly as hard.
3:42
Yeah.
3:43
And then what else I want to talk to you about also?
3:45
So the preparation, but the sacrifice.
3:50
Can I just hold you back?
3:52
I don't think...
3:54
that I ever sacrificed a single thing in order to achieve what I did.
4:00
I understand that some people might think that, you know, on a weekend you don't go out to the cinema, you don't go out with your friends, because on Sunday morning you have to be there at 10 o'clock in the morning and doing your best.
4:12
But that is what I wanted to, even at a young age, give my life to.
4:18
And so I never saw it as being a sacrifice.
4:23
And looking back now, as you can do with a bit of perspective, I considered it a privilege to be able to just go and do that.
4:32
Wow.
4:33
Okay.
4:34
Because we sort of, I sort of, people said to me when, this is interesting for you too, when you retired, did you feel a sense of relief that I can now have a normal life?
4:44
Oh, no, because I thought that my life was pretty normal.
4:48
I never considered myself that different.
4:53
It was just that I wanted to do slightly different things from other people.
4:57
I considered what I did during the weekend and the weekends just to be my job.
5:03
And one of the things that I learned from quite a strict Scottish mother is a really good work ethic.
5:13
And it never occurred to me that if I had the time, why I wouldn't go training, why I wouldn't be trying to get better.
5:22
Because I think I understood that every time you go and you compete, you tell yourself, you know, you tell other people about yourself.
5:35
and the impression or whatever I wanted to give people was that, one, I was a really good competitor, and, B, that it meant lots to me.
5:45
And so I was quite very happy to go out and...
5:49
So I understand that because you were a multiple winner, so you could see that what you were doing on the practice field paid dividends, so that was good.
5:59
Absolutely.
6:00
What about when you were 18...
6:03
so we're getting sidetracked here already, when you were 18 and you finished 18th at your first Olympics, did you go home and think, whew,
6:11
All this work I've been putting in is not paying off.
6:15
I'm never going to be as good as Bruce Jenner.
6:17
Truthfully, I went home and I thought to myself, I've done five decathlons in my life and I've just been the 18th best person in the world.
6:27
How good am I going to be when I've done 10?
6:29
Wow.
6:30
Because I remember I did my first decathlon and...
6:36
as you're going to ask me later on, I'd only done three of the events before, but I'd had four or five weeks training.
6:42
But on the middle, in the night in between the two days, I remember going to bed.
6:49
I was knackered, and I remember thinking to myself,
6:51
Vividly.
6:52
And I remember thinking to myself, I'm going to be really good at this one day.
6:57
Really?
6:58
Yeah.
6:58
And I just and I just knew it because I had unconsciously, I think, I've always searched.
7:08
for something that I was going to be good at.
7:10
Because that's all I ever wanted to be when I was a kid, is good at something.
7:13
I didn't care what it was.
7:14
I'd have been happy to be the world's best dustman, or the world's best house painter, or whatever.
7:21
And obviously it was going to be sport.
7:23
And as soon as I say, as soon as I found the decathlon, I just thought to myself, well, this is the thing.
7:30
I could have been completely wrong.
7:32
And it might have just been that bravado you have as a kid, that way you think you can do anything.
7:37
But I, yes, it just really occurred to me that, yeah, 18th wasn't bad.
7:43
But as I say, it was my fifth ever decathlon.
7:46
Fifth ever?
7:47
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7:48
Fifth.
7:50
So basically, some of the things, it was the fifth time I'd ever done the hurdles or pole vault.
7:55
Absolutely.
7:56
Absolutely.
7:57
Yeah, so yeah, I was, yeah, and I was just so sure.
8:00
I was just so sure.
8:01
And yeah, you can see the smile on my face.
8:04
Okay, so I'm a little fat kid growing up in New Zealand.
8:07
That doesn't surprise me.
8:08
Yeah.
8:09
Father was an all black.
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Everyone expected me to be an all black.
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So I went to a rugby school and things progressed and eventually I realised that I had talent.
8:21
But I look at you and I want you to tell me, I know, but I want you to tell the listeners, we actually live in Notting Hill now.
8:29
And that is where you are literally 200 down the road from where we live is where you were brought up.
8:37
In terms of your childhood, were you a competitive kid?
8:43
Were you an annoying kid?
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All those things that I see in you, those things that you will never do, you'll never change.
8:52
Were you like that as a little boy growing up in Notting Hill?
8:56
I was absolutely like that as a little kid.
8:59
All I ever wanted to do was A, be outside running around, and I was always pushing the edge of things.
9:08
Yeah.
9:08
You know, so I wasn't a naughty kid.
9:11
I was mischievous.
9:12
Yes.
9:13
Because I just wanted to know about the world, and I just, you know, I like reading books, and I like going out and playing.
9:20
I like climbing trees, and I just...
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I just enjoyed kids' life.
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And it's funny you should be living in Notting Hill Gate because when I lived there, it was the last place anybody wanted to live.
9:34
Okay.
9:35
And they weren't slums or anything.
9:38
It was a rough neighbourhood?
9:40
Oh, God, it was really rough.
9:42
And it was all full of immigrants and all that kind of stuff and has become very, very gentrified since I left.
9:51
You had a Nigerian father.
9:53
Yes.
9:53
You were the middle of three children.
9:55
Absolutely.
9:55
Mum was Scottish.
9:56
She was.
9:57
I love that you kept that quiet, I must say.
10:02
Because I love the Scots.
10:06
And then you wanted to be a footballer.
10:08
Yes, absolutely.
10:10
Like all the kids that I knew, and we used to play football all night, well not all night, all day, during the holidays and stuff, we just used to be out there, and if we weren't playing football, we were just out running around the streets, because I don't know what it was like in New Zealand, but...
10:29
We just used to, straight after breakfast, we used to go out, we used to, as I say, play a bit of football, and then just be out all day.
10:36
I don't want to see you eat all dinnertime.
10:37
Absolutely.
10:38
Yeah, mum and dad.
10:39
Yes, absolutely.
10:40
And it was how the world was.
10:43
I know it's completely different these days, but parents were busy.
10:48
They, you know, working.
10:49
Working, probably.
10:50
Absolutely.
10:51
And yeah.
10:53
Like for us, we'd do exactly the same.
10:55
We'd be playing rugby in the backyard.
10:57
But we all had that competitive streak.
10:59
When you talk about winning, even then, winning was the most important thing.
11:05
And you're not going to win everything.
11:06
Aren't you?
11:08
You might not.
11:10
But I'd imagine with you, with the drive that you had to become the greatest decathlete ever, you must have had that as a young child.
11:19
Oh, God, yeah.
11:20
No, I was really competitive.
11:22
And I remember, even when I was 12, we went on our first and only ever holiday to a place called Butlins.
11:31
I don't know.
11:32
Right, anyway, it's really cheap and really cheerful.
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And they had a swimming pool there.
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And they were having some races on one of the days.
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So I decided,
11:43
you know what, I am a really good swimmer.
11:46
I might want to be a swimmer.
11:48
And so I went into a race swimming and they almost had to send the lifeguard in to get me because I was a rubbish swimmer.
12:00
Oh, are we?
12:01
Yeah, so I quickly crossed that off.
12:03
Crossed the awfulest.
12:04
But yeah, no, I wanted to try absolutely everything.
12:08
And it wasn't so much that I wanted to win, I just wanted to see if I could do it well.
12:15
Yeah, yeah.
12:16
You know, of course I wanted to win and everything, but I really, more than anything, just thought I could do anything.
12:22
And one of the things that I think has characterized me over the years
12:27
is the fact that, you know when you're young, you wanna be good and you wanna be a superhero and all that kind of stuff, but as you grow up, life kind of takes the edges off, and you learn you can't, you can't, and that kind of stuff.
12:47
But that never, apart from swimming, that never happened to me.
12:50
I was always- You say that though, but how good were you at football?
12:55
Well, I thought I was Pele in the mainframe.
12:59
You went to athletics.
13:00
Was that because you were no good at football?
13:02
No, I went to athletics just because I wanted to be really fit to play football.
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So I just went down my local athletics club just to get fit because we were going on a tour.
13:16
How old were you then?
13:17
14.
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13 or 14.
13:19
Okay, so we've jumped ahead.
13:21
So you've Notting Hill.
13:24
Yeah.
13:25
And then you go to boarding school.
13:26
Yes, I go to boarding school.
13:27
And like any kids, we played football in the winter and we did a bit of cricket and a little bit of athletics in the summer.
13:37
And that's where you initially felt that you wanted to go down the athletics track.
13:43
Absolutely, because I was the fastest kid in my school.
13:47
Was that your big thing was you were a fast runner?
13:49
Yeah, absolutely.
13:50
And were you quite a big kid?
13:51
No.
13:52
Your father was Nigerian, so he was a big man.
13:54
He was a bit of a lump, yeah.
13:55
He was about six foot four.
13:57
And no, I was a skinny kid.
14:00
I was scrawny.
14:01
Oh, really?
14:03
And so, yes, I was quite quick.
14:04
As I say, I was probably the fastest kid in my school by the time I was 13.
14:09
I would think, but it was only a really small school.
14:12
There was only 100 kids in it.
14:14
50 girls, 50 boys.
14:17
So then your exposure to athletics, not Cathlon.
14:22
No, no, no.
14:24
I just was a sprinter.
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And when I was probably 15, I won the Sussex Schools 100 metres, or 200 metres, 200 metres.
14:37
and went to the English schools where all of the best kids in the country.
14:43
Yes, okay.
14:43
And of course I was going to win that, but I came fourth.
14:46
In the 200?
14:47
In the 200.
14:47
And the 100?
14:48
No, you can only do one.
14:49
Oh, you can only do, oh no.
14:50
So I did it.
14:51
Why did you do 200 instead of 100?
14:52
100.
14:54
No idea.
14:54
It just felt right.
14:56
So in the trials, in the Sussex trials, I just went for the 200.
15:01
And as I say, I went there to the English schools and came fourth.
15:05
Nice.
15:06
And I just thought to myself, fourth, all right, but you could do better.
15:11
So we'll train a bit more and all that.
15:14
Because I understood, I think I understood then, that even though it's not a guarantee,
15:21
the more you put in, the more likely you are to get out.
15:23
Okay.
15:24
So that was, I already knew that subconsciously.
15:29
And I'm thinking back to your days of football.
15:32
Was it easy to move over to athletics where it's an individual sport, predominantly?
15:39
Rather than a team sport?
15:41
Absolutely.
15:41
Because you're quite selfish.
15:42
Yeah, no, I'm really selfish.
15:43
Thank you very much, buddy.
15:45
No, yeah, no, it was very easy because it was where I thought I was going to do best.
15:52
Right.
15:54
And that was all because I'd like to think.
15:55
That's amazing.
15:56
At what age is this?
15:57
14?
15:58
Yeah.
15:58
So you've identified that I'm not going to be the next Pelé.
16:02
Yep.
16:03
But I could potentially be the next Bruce Jenner.
16:05
No, I could potentially be, who would it have been there?
16:10
No, no.
16:11
But you're absolutely, Valerie Bortsoff, or Jim Hines, the world record holder for the 100.
16:16
I absolutely thought that.
16:17
It's amazing that you had this love for athletics art.
16:19
I don't know if it was a love for athletics.
16:21
It was a love of something I thought I was going to be good at.
16:24
And speed.
16:25
Yes.
16:26
You like speed.
16:27
Oh, well, that was my thing.
16:29
That's my gift, is that I am fairly explosive.
16:34
Okay.
16:35
You know, clearly I'm not the most explosive because, you're right, Carl Lewis or Linford Christie is.
16:40
Yes.
16:40
But back then I was, you know, I was.
16:43
And then, so that's 14, and then you identified that,
16:47
The athletics was my thing.
16:49
Athletics.
16:49
That's what, and up until I started doing the decathlon, up until that night in between the decathlon when I thought I could be good at this, I thought I was going to be the best sprinter in Europe or whatever it was.
17:04
God.
17:04
Like, now you say that, this built-in confidence you had,
17:08
No, absolutely.
17:09
It's something I never had that.
17:10
I never had that until.
17:11
I never had any doubt in my mind that I was going to be successful at something.
17:17
Oh, that's wonderful.
17:19
I love that because that's.
17:20
well that's how I know you that's what that's you know your personality now is just hasn't changed much confidence yeah well and the other thing is I think I think when you were a kid so many things thank God are black and white aren't they yeah you either can or you can't yes you know the answer or you don't and all that and I'm still and unfortunately I'm still a bit like that now I don't have a lot of grey do you think that came from your Scottish mother or from your father
17:49
Well, Dad was, to be honest, was never around.
17:53
And so he didn't have very much influence on me at all.
17:56
But I think having a mother who, A, did everything for you, B, had two or three jobs at any one time to make sure that, you know.
18:06
And, yeah, I think she was very kind of...
18:10
Determined.
18:11
Yes, determined and also... Loving.
18:15
If you can't do this, don't worry, try something else.
18:19
But don't waste your time.
18:22
And so that's how I was.
18:23
Because you're an incredibly positive person.
18:26
Thank you.
18:27
But in situations that are...
18:30
You know, oh, God.
18:31
You'll find something positive out of that.
18:34
Well, do you know what?
18:35
I think you have to.
18:36
Yeah.
18:37
I think in order to stay on track, you know, if you're trying to do something that is difficult and not something that's easy because that's always going to happen.
18:45
Yes.
18:46
But if you're trying to do something difficult in life, I think that you have to take the losses and change the loss into what I would call a learn.
18:56
Positive, yeah, yeah.
18:58
And that's what I do.
19:00
Because you're right.
19:00
I don't win everything, but I tend to win by the end.
19:05
In some way.
19:06
In some way, yes, absolutely.
19:08
My kids will tell you I cheat.
19:09
Okay, here we go.
19:10
I'm like, that's terrible with the kids.
19:14
I have to win everything.
19:15
I play backgammon and I have to win.
19:17
I like beating them.
19:19
So do I.
19:19
And then you start feeling, don't be sorry, don't feel sorry.
19:24
That was terrible.
19:27
So then somehow you founded a decathlon, which when I said in the opening, like 10 disciplines and you were the best in the world.
19:38
Well, no, because no.
19:40
I know you were useless at 1,500.
19:42
No, don't go that far.
19:43
Sebco or Steve Ovette might say.
19:46
But yes, no, the thing is, that isn't how I looked at it.
19:50
I looked at it as being a single thing.
19:53
Yeah.
19:54
And because...
19:55
That actually is the only thing that I could be the best in the world at.
20:01
And I never looked at it as being 10 individual things.
20:04
I thought it was 10 things that made up.
20:07
That gave you the opportunity.
20:09
Yes, absolutely.
20:10
Because I was okay as a sprintner.
20:11
I was okay as a long jumper.
20:13
And, you know, I could do the hurdles and the discs and all that.
20:16
But the thing that I could do better than anybody else was...
20:20
Was the whole thing, absolutely.
20:22
So by the time you got to the 1500, which was their last event, more often than not you had the gold medal on the back.
20:28
Always.
20:29
Yeah.
20:29
Yeah, no, listen, absolutely.
20:31
It was all done by then.
20:32
And that for me, obviously, was brilliant.
20:36
And people thought that I wasn't trying and stuff in the 1500, but I was trying as hard as I could.
20:43
I just didn't happen to be that good at it.
20:46
You were at school when you started training.
20:49
You found a coach?
20:50
Yeah, I found a coach.
20:52
I started training with a man called Bob Mortimer who was a coach at Essex Beagles.
20:58
Right.
20:59
And he turned me into a reasonable 15-, 16-, 17-year-old sprinter.
21:08
And the year after I came fourth at the English schools, I won that in the 200s.
21:13
How old were you then?
21:16
15 stroke 16.
21:17
So you're competing against 18 year olds?
21:20
No, up to 16.
21:21
It's a two year thing.
21:22
So I was the best in the country at the 200 meters.
21:26
And he came up to me one day and he said to me, do you know what a decathlon is?
21:31
And I said, absolutely no idea, Bob, what is it?
21:34
And he explained it to me.
21:35
And then he told me that there was a team decathlon going on in four or five weeks.
21:40
And one of the four guys that was doing it
21:45
He had chickenpox, so he couldn't go.
21:46
And would I go and do it?
21:47
And I said, well, I haven't done seven of the things.
21:49
You hadn't done seven of the events?
21:51
Yeah, I hadn't done pole vault.
21:52
You've never heard about pole vault?
21:53
Yeah, javelin and all that.
21:54
But you'd done high jump?
21:56
Yeah, I'd done long jump, high jump 100.
21:58
Okay, which is all sprinting.
21:59
Yeah, exactly.
22:01
And he said, it doesn't matter if you don't finish.
22:03
All you've got to do is start.
22:05
And if you want to train for the events in the next four or five weeks, just go ahead and do it.
22:11
That's amazing.
22:12
By yourself?
22:12
Did you ever try?
22:13
I didn't have a coach or anything, but there were people around.
22:16
There were other discus throwers there, and they showed me which foot goes where and all that kind of stuff.
22:22
So, yeah, from little beginnings and, you know.
22:27
So I've got here, in terms of winning matters, did you have to learn how to win?
22:33
No, I was good at that already.
22:35
I'd had a little bit of practice, so I was good.
22:38
Because I'll tell you what, one of the things that I found over my career that I did, or that I learned to do, or was taught to do, I'm not sure how it started, was that I've
22:52
coaching, at least in our country, they don't teach you, they teach you all the techniques and stuff, but what they don't teach you is how to win or how to be competitive.
23:05
And one of the things we used to do that was different to what anybody else would do was that in the middle of a training session, so we're out there and we've already done the hurdles, let's pretend, and we've done some long jump and we're now throwing the discus,
23:19
And today we might have to do 120 throws, let's say, in the discus.
23:25
And at one point, the coach would just say, now.
23:30
And what we'd have to do is we'd have to have a competition.
23:35
You get one throw, and whoever gets closest to their best, because obviously we all throw different distances, whoever gets closest to their best is the winner, and whoever comes last has to buy everybody a milkshake.
23:46
Right, okay.
23:47
And we would do that on all the events, all of the time, whenever the coach said it.
23:52
So you learn to get comfortable competing, because it just happened to be the thing that we do.
23:59
And I've never known any other coaches try and teach that.
24:04
And I love that, because that's what I'm good at, is being able to concentrate for that second and do it.
24:12
In my early days.
24:14
One of the things a rugby coach told me, he wasn't a very good rugby coach, but he was a great person.
24:19
He told us three things.
24:21
The first thing is everyone on the team is equal.
24:24
The second thing, I want you to turn up here with a bit of attitude.
24:27
Absolutely.
24:27
Which is exactly you.
24:29
Absolutely.
24:29
Attitude.
24:30
And then the most important thing, which is what you're all about and what we're about, is all I want you to be is the best you can be.
24:37
There you go.
24:38
Isn't that fantastic?
24:39
No, absolutely.
24:39
I say to kids today because that's what winning is about.
24:42
And that's what he was actually saying to us is that winning matters.
24:46
And if you have an attitude that I want to win, and everything you have seen in the last 20 minutes is about winning.
24:53
Absolutely.
24:53
Even though I have that doubt about winning when I was a kid growing up.
24:56
But you had no doubt about winning.
24:58
But I think if we look at it, not just at you and I, but if we look at it in general public,
25:05
Winning actually isn't necessarily about coming first or second.
25:12
What it is about is doing yourself justice.
25:15
Because there's always gonna be people faster than you or stronger than you or whatever.
25:20
But if you're hitting your maximums and all that kind of stuff, you can, if you take it in some kind of context, you can still be a winner.
25:29
It's just that somebody else just happens to be.
25:31
Then I always say to kids, if you don't win,
25:35
Then, like you when you were 18 at the first Olympics, and we didn't win.
25:40
You went away and think, right.
25:42
I've got this.
25:43
I've got this.
25:44
I can get better.
25:44
Absolutely.
25:45
I can get better.
25:46
And that's why I say to children, just analyse why you didn't win.
25:50
Yeah.
25:50
Maybe you're not good enough.
25:52
Maybe you haven't practised hard enough.
25:54
Maybe you need to try a different sport.
25:56
Yeah.
25:56
Yeah.
25:56
Well, maybe you just haven't got the right attitude.
25:59
And it's the same in life.
26:00
I always say, when you get out of bed this morning, you think about how you run your life on a day-to-day.
26:07
Every day is a, let's do something.
26:08
When we're walking in here, it said, you and I need to do something together.
26:11
No, absolutely.
26:12
Because you're right, I get out of bed every day, sometimes at six, sometimes at 10, and I think to myself,
26:21
I'm gonna do something today.
26:22
I don't know what it's gonna be, but today I'm gonna do something well.
26:26
Even if it's walk to the shops faster than I've ever walked before.
26:30
I mean, as I say, I try and get something positive out of every day.
26:35
Wow.
26:35
And I'll tell you what, a couple of days ago, I was out walking at six o'clock in the morning.
26:41
Yeah.
26:42
And,
26:44
I had, I saw the most fantastic sunrise.
26:48
And I just thought to myself, How lucky am I?
26:50
Yeah, no, absolutely.
26:51
And I took that and it made my whole day that just because I'm lucky enough to see some orange sky.
27:00
And you think of the pressures of today.
27:02
Everything that's going on in the world, personal lives, economy, and that attitude.
27:08
Anyone can have that attitude.
27:09
Yeah, absolutely.
27:10
Well, you're right.
27:11
That is actually the thing.
27:13
You are in charge of that.
27:15
You can take it as a positive or you can let it get you down.
27:19
And people like you and I, more often than not, we take it as a positive.
27:24
From then you were 18.
27:26
So you went to the first Olympics at 18.
27:28
You'd already won the Commonwealth Gold.
27:31
No, I hadn't been to my Commonwealth.
27:33
No, no, no.
27:33
That was my first big competition.
27:35
Oh, so the Olympics.
27:36
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
27:37
When you came 18th, you had only done five.
27:40
Literally, yeah.
27:41
I'd just been in county things and that kind of stuff.
27:45
Okay.
27:45
So then you go back and you've spoken about this person before, Bruce Jenner.
27:52
Absolutely.
27:53
Absolutely.
27:54
who Caitlin now Caitlin Caitlin Jenner who you annoyed the hell out apparently yeah that's that's what she says and she she was just the goat
28:05
Oh, she was my hero.
28:07
And nice.
28:10
He'd won previous Olympics?
28:11
No, I think he'd come eighth or fifth in the previous Olympics in 72.
28:16
You sent me a photo last year.
28:17
Tenth, maybe tenth.
28:18
You sent me a photo last year of the two of you out.
28:21
Yeah, we are out having dinner.
28:22
Having dinner, which was fantastic.
28:25
But she looks big.
28:26
I mean, in terms of back in… Yeah, back then, I think six foot two or so.
28:32
76.
28:32
Yeah.
28:34
Six foot two, so bigger than you.
28:36
Oh, yeah.
28:38
But just cleaned up the field.
28:40
Yeah.
28:41
What was she scoring in those days?
28:42
8,627, something like that.
28:44
Which is huge.
28:45
Yeah, well, it's a world record.
28:46
Yeah.
28:47
So nobody had ever done it for them.
28:50
Oh, now they have, yeah.
28:51
Have they?
28:52
Yeah.
28:54
I'm sorry.
28:56
Yeah, come on.
28:57
I did our dailys of world record holders, so four times.
29:02
So what did you learn from her?
29:05
I will be honest with you.
29:07
Did she teach you how to win?
29:08
First of all, she was just fantastic.
29:13
You're right.
29:14
I was bugging her all the time, talking about wanting to talk about training, wanting to talk about it.
29:19
And, you know, obviously she was trying to win the Olympic gold, but she still found a little time to talk to me.
29:26
And then at the end of it, she said, listen, if you ever come to California and you want to look me up and talk about training and stuff, I'll be very happy to do it.
29:36
And I did that a couple of times before 80.
29:40
And it was just...
29:43
Amazing how single-minded and focused she was.
29:49
Because, for instance, and you'll probably think this is really stupid, and then I'll tell you I had two of them.
29:56
So she told me that when she was at home, in her kitchen,
30:02
there was a hurdle.
30:03
And every time she walked in there, she walked over the hurdle.
30:06
So I put two in our corridor.
30:10
And it was just little things like that.
30:12
And she would say, you know,
30:15
And now I live 600 yards from the track, but I run a mile and a half or two miles there every day.
30:24
Wow.
30:24
So you ran around?
30:26
Absolutely.
30:26
So I used to do the same.
30:28
I used to run there and back two or three times a day.
30:32
And it was all those little things.
30:34
But I think more than anything, it showed me...
30:38
the mindset.
30:40
You know, you have to be prepared to give it your all.
30:45
If you really want to be the best.
30:49
So we spoke about it at the top of the show in terms of the sacrifice.
30:52
Yeah, not sacrifice.
30:55
See, I always say, preparation and sacrifice.
30:57
The preparation.
30:58
So the preparation to be the best you can be is just paramount.
31:04
I think so, particularly in things like athletics, because it's only about 101% performance.
31:11
It's only about the very best you can do, because there's only a few people that can do it at less than their best.
31:18
So somebody like Edwin Moses, for instance.
31:21
Edwin Moses, at the time, was physically...
31:28
So gifted.
31:29
He was 15% better than anybody else.
31:32
So he didn't have to always be at his best in order to win.
31:37
Right.
31:38
Whereas most people, even at the top, have to be right on that very edge between being the world record holder and being injured.
31:49
And do you think it's, I played a team sport.
31:51
Yeah.
31:52
So we always say you could hide.
31:55
Yeah.
31:55
If you wanted to, you could hide.
31:56
Yeah.
31:57
Being an Olympic champion in an athletic individual sport, there is nowhere to hide.
32:03
Well.
32:04
Did you think about that when you were preparing?
32:06
No, why would I do that?
32:07
But it must be in the back of your mind.
32:09
Why?
32:09
Okay, okay.
32:10
Because it's in the back of yours.
32:14
Because you can get exposed.
32:15
Like in rugby, you can get exposed.
32:17
Yes, but... You can miss a tackle.
32:19
You can drop the ball, which you can do in your sport.
32:24
No, no, listen.
32:25
Listen, absolutely.
32:26
But I think you're right.
32:29
I think you lessen the chances of it happening
32:33
The more you do.
32:33
Okay.
32:35
At least in my mind.
32:35
Okay, so let's go take a different angle.
32:37
Go on.
32:38
The fear of failure.
32:40
What is that?
32:41
So I always had a fear of failure.
32:45
then I harness the fear of failure.
32:47
So if you can harness the fear of failure, you're not going to have that fear of failure.
32:52
So putting on this all-black jersey, kids who'd play for their provinces and play for their clubs, best players in the world in their position, they'd put that all-black jersey on.
33:01
And shoot themselves, yeah, absolutely.
33:04
Because the expectation, right?
33:06
They hadn't prepared for it.
33:07
But the expectation, yes, exactly.
33:10
So the expectation that comes with wearing the black jersey, right?
33:14
So how do you harness that fear of failure?
33:16
You do what you do.
33:17
You prepare better than anyone else.
33:20
Absolutely.
33:20
Bum, bum, bum, bum.
33:21
Absolutely.
33:21
How do you harness it?
33:22
You prepare, prepare, prepare.
33:24
Golfers, decathletes.
33:26
Yeah.
33:26
They practice, they practice, they repeat, repeat, repeat.
33:29
And when it comes to game day...
33:31
No problem.
33:32
No.
33:33
And the other thing that it does, it settles you in your mind because... You're confident.
33:37
You know you've earned it.
33:39
Mm-hmm.
33:39
Mm-hmm.
33:40
You know you have sweated your nuts off.
33:42
But daily, for me, that came with age.
33:46
Right.
33:46
That came...
33:48
I'd run into a stadium, and honestly, the best part of the game was when it was finished.
33:52
Right.
33:52
And we'd won.
33:53
Yeah.
33:53
And I was like, oh, thank God, that's over.
33:55
Can I just, I like this, this continuation of this.
33:59
And that is, and I don't know if this is the same or we might think it's the same, but I didn't have a fear of failure.
34:06
What I had was a slight fear of not...
34:13
Making the most of my talent.
34:16
Did you think, you knew you were talented?
34:19
I'm like, this is so...
34:21
I'm always taking the mickey out of you.
34:23
I'm always taking the mickey out of you.
34:24
It's so true.
34:25
You're probably the most confident man I've ever met.
34:29
No, but Sean, I promise you, I never had a second's doubt that I was going to be the world's greatest athlete.
34:34
Once I found the decathlon, I...
34:37
Yes, yes.
34:38
And the other thing, as we said, I never had those edges taken off, and all through my athletics career...
34:46
I was getting better.
34:48
Every year I was a little faster, I was a little stronger, I could jump a little further, throw a little further.
34:54
And that all just kind of reinforced my thinking.
35:00
18, 22, 26.
35:02
So do you think when you won in LA, you were 26?
35:06
26.
35:07
Do you think you were at the peak of your game then?
35:09
No, I had my best decathlons in 86.
35:12
Oh, really?
35:13
Okay.
35:14
In 86.
35:15
And then I had two or three years where I was just injured all the time.
35:19
So 84.
35:19
So that was Europeans?
35:20
Yes, it was.
35:21
Okay.
35:22
It was in Stuttgart.
35:23
But I thought that...
35:25
Physically, if I just held together, not necessarily getting better, if I'd have just held together, I should have won in Seoul in 88.
35:34
But I didn't because I hurt myself a couple of days before the decathlon.
35:39
Oh, really?
35:40
Yeah.
35:40
But otherwise, I mean, I was still scoring miles more points than anybody else.
35:44
Yes.
35:46
And that's the way it is.
35:47
Life is, you know, you can't win all the time.
35:51
So just getting back to that mindset.
35:54
So the preparation and the sacrifice and the fear of failure.
35:58
See, the fear of failure for me was a huge motivating factor.
36:02
When I got dropped and when we lost the World Cup in 91,
36:10
being in a bad space in terms of preparation and fitness.
36:14
And then in 92, I had an opportunity.
36:17
But that fear of failure was just such a driving force for me.
36:22
And then I was 30, 29, 28, 29, and I wanted to be better than the young kids.
36:28
The young kids that were coming in, we'd have this 3K time trial.
36:32
Right.
36:32
That would be the gauge where you had to, and
36:36
And I wanted to beat all the young kids.
36:37
Okay.
36:38
So I actually trained.
36:40
You could actually train for a 3K.
36:41
Yeah, absolutely.
36:42
Just running around the track, how many times that is, whatever it is.
36:45
And then the body fat test.
36:47
Yeah.
36:48
Most people were sort of the fitter guys, the slighter guys were all around sort of single-digit body fat.
36:54
Wow, that's good.
36:55
And the big guys were double-digit, 12, 13, 14.
37:00
That's still not bad for big guys.
37:01
I wanted to be single-digit, right?
37:02
So I made sure I got down to there.
37:04
But it was all that, that was that preparation to be better and that fear of failure, but harnessing that fear of failure.
37:10
Because I love that.
37:12
Then the expectation as I got older.
37:16
I loved people expecting the All Blacks to win.
37:20
And I still expect the All Blacks to win.
37:21
But what comes out so clearly in you, your expectation was you're going to win.
37:26
No, absolutely.
37:26
When you round the theatre, it was like, and as you get older, you think, well, that's pretty cool.
37:30
There's 100,000 people here.
37:32
They've all come to watch us.
37:33
They've all come to watch you.
37:34
And that's the pressure of expectation is so good.
37:40
I loved it.
37:41
No, I think once you learn how to handle it and how to harness it, I mean, I remember being in stadiums, obviously, when there's other things going on.
37:53
And let's say we're in the high jump and the final of the men's long jump is going on across the other side of the stadium.
38:03
I would wait until somebody really good has gone in the long jump.
38:08
There'll be a huge, big roar.
38:11
Man, they're calling me!
38:14
That roars for me, they want to see me make this next height.
38:18
And I would use that, those kinds of things.
38:20
You mentioned there in 88, 88 was the Olympics?
38:25
Yeah, Seoul.
38:27
How did you deal with that?
38:28
After everything we've spoken about, being such a winner, and expecting to win, people expecting you to win, how did you deal with failure?
38:39
So I came fourth.
38:40
Yeah, well that's failing.
38:41
Yeah, yeah, no sure.
38:42
For you, that's, you know, you're the champion.
38:44
Yeah, and funny enough, the only reason that I finished it was because I was the head boy of the decathlon and to drop out in the middle of it wouldn't have suited the standards that I thought I should be held to.
38:58
So I did that and you're right, it was very difficult for me.
39:03
But again, you try and put it into some kind of context, it doesn't work for a year or two, but the context is I think I did the best I possibly could under the circumstances.
39:15
Because as you get older, and by then I was whatever it was, I was 30,
39:22
you understand that sometimes people are better and all that other kind of stuff.
39:28
Because what we do isn't like boxing and wrestling.
39:32
Nobody can affect you and you can't really affect other people.
39:36
So yeah, you get that kind of context.
39:40
I still think to myself occasionally now, 45, 40 years later, oh, you should have been a triple Olympic champion and all that kind of stuff.
39:49
Quite hard, though.
39:50
Yeah, no, it is.
39:51
But, you know.
39:52
It's like in a World Cup rugby.
39:53
Yeah.
39:53
Twos back to back.
39:55
You can do it.
39:56
The third one's always a challenge.
39:58
No.
39:58
You're a bit older.
39:58
Yeah.
40:00
Yeah, training like you were, 350 days a year.
40:03
Body's getting a bit sore, a bit older.
40:05
Absolutely.
40:06
Absolutely.
40:06
Still fun, though.
40:07
Yeah.
40:08
There was nothing else I'd rather do.
40:09
That was the thing.
40:10
So you won two gold medals.
40:12
Yes.
40:12
After finishing 18th.
40:13
I like sort of reminding you.
40:15
No, I've noticed that.
40:16
I've noticed that.
40:16
So standing on the podium in Russia, in Moscow in 1980, that was your first gold medal.
40:23
You were champion.
40:24
First Olympic gold medal.
40:25
Yeah, absolutely.
40:25
First Olympic gold medal.
40:27
What did that feel like?
40:28
Honestly, it felt like the start of what I hoped was a really good career.
40:37
Because for whatever reason, I had planned to have...
40:46
long stay in it and the reason I say that is because up until about 79 or 80 I'd kept a training diary Yeah, and in my chat and so obviously I started it when I was 17 18 and when in 76 after 76 I wrote in my training diary I Reckon I am gonna be in the top 10 in 1980
41:15
First five in 1984 and I'm going to win in 1988.
41:21
Wow.
41:22
Okay.
41:22
So at the age, at the age of 18, I'm thinking to myself, I'm thinking seriously long term.
41:28
Yeah.
41:29
But were, were other athletes, I know now in rugby, everyone has a training diary.
41:34
Everyone has it.
41:34
So you had a training diary back then?
41:36
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
41:37
I had a trained dose to write everything.
41:38
And at the beginning of every year, so this would have been the beginning of 77.
41:42
You were here to yourself.
41:44
I was writing that stuff down.
41:46
I didn't realize that by 88 I'd be finished.
41:48
Yeah, okay.
41:49
But I was thinking completely long term.
41:54
And did you feel a... See, this is me being a bit naughty.
41:58
So in Moscow, the Americans weren't there.
42:02
Lucky for them.
42:02
And the West Germans weren't there.
42:04
Lucky for them.
42:05
So that didn't worry you?
42:07
Well, you can only beat the people that are in front of you.
42:10
And also, I'd give them all a good kick in two months before in Austria, in another decathlon.
42:17
So they didn't want to go.
42:19
Yeah, they didn't want to go.
42:20
They had the opportunity, but they were too scared.
42:23
Okay, so that's Moscow.
42:24
Then go four years on, four years on, which is probably your greatest Olympics.
42:29
Yeah.
42:29
LA.
42:29
Yeah, yeah.
42:30
What did that feel like?
42:32
It was fabulous.
42:33
I'd been working out in a place called Irvine, which is about 30 or 40 miles south of Los Angeles for, I think, two and a half or three months.
42:44
Yeah.
42:44
Yeah.
42:44
So I was there in the sunshine and acclimatized, and I was seriously ready, and I just couldn't wait for it.
42:52
And unlike Moscow, where it was all kind of gray and people didn't smile in the streets and all that kind of stuff, Los Angeles was all technicolor and movie stars and swimming pools, and it was just a great, great atmosphere.
43:12
And tell me, was Bruce Jenner there?
43:15
Did he contact you or did you contact him?
43:18
No, no, no.
43:19
I think he might have been in the opening ceremony.
43:22
And that's a guess.
43:23
But no, no, no.
43:24
I was too busy.
43:25
I was too busy by then.
43:26
Amazing.
43:27
Yeah.
43:27
But no, it was, you know...
43:30
I'm not, again, I'm not one of those people that, the reason I can't give you much more detail about it is because I'm not one of those people that dwells on it.
43:39
As soon as it's done, for me, six hours later, I'll tell you, it's done.
43:43
And I'm looking forward to the next challenge.
43:47
The next event?
43:48
Yeah, absolutely.
43:49
It's like us when we won the World Cup in 87.
43:52
We were back at work on Monday morning.
43:53
Yeah, no, absolutely.
43:55
And honestly, it was a relief that we'd won the World Cup.
44:01
And because the expectation was that we were going to win, we should win, and we wanted to win the first World Cup.
44:06
And it was like, oh, thank God that's over.
44:09
I can now go to the next challenge.
44:11
Yeah, no, listen, absolutely.
44:12
Can I just say one other thing, just about the mental thing about winning or being the best or whatever it is.
44:20
And that is that
44:24
A lot of people who I know who have been world record holders, world champions and all that kind of stuff, don't always do really well at the Olympics.
44:38
Because it's a whole different kind of mindset.
44:41
At the Olympics, when you go to, for instance, you go to Zurich, one of the big track meets,
44:49
If it's on a Wednesday, let's pretend, you get there on a Tuesday and you go into your room, you have breakfast next day, you go and run, break the world record, and then you go home the next day.
45:03
So you don't have to interact with anybody.
45:05
You go to an Olympic Games...
45:07
You're spending two or three weeks in a village that's got 15,000 people in it.
45:15
And all the people who you hate in the world are in the dining room.
45:20
And sometimes you actually have to sit on tables with those people who you cannot stand.
45:26
The people you're competing against.
45:27
Absolutely.
45:28
And that...
45:30
kills people's performances.
45:32
It just brings them down.
45:33
That's why quite a few of the best people live outside.
45:38
Won't go to the villages.
45:39
Yeah, don't go to the villages, live outside, go into hotels, maybe go in the night before, like they do in Zurich.
45:45
But back in the day, in the 80s and 90s, they didn't really let you do that very much.
45:51
You got on well with, who was your main guy after Janet Eugson, was it?
45:55
Jürgen Hincksen, a German guy.
45:57
Yeah, we got on really well now, much better now.
45:59
But not then.
46:00
Well, no, because it will be difficult because we're both after the same thing.
46:04
And I was the only one who was going to win it.
46:05
I was like, horrible.
46:06
Yeah.
46:07
No, no.
46:07
I didn't even want to talk to my opposition.
46:09
Yeah.
46:09
And I might have a beer with them.
46:11
Oh, no, see, I would never have done that.
46:13
I would tell them nothing about me, nothing about my family.
46:16
I didn't want them to know what I was really like.
46:18
What a miserable get.
46:19
Yeah, well, no, actually...
46:23
But the thing is that you're exactly the same.
46:25
See, I would change, but not go over the white line.
46:27
I was a different person.
46:28
Oh, I'm not, yeah.
46:30
You are exactly the same person on the field as he bloody offered.
46:34
That's what I've learned today, actually.
46:36
It's been quite a good time.
46:36
No, absolutely.
46:37
But, yes, it's not for everybody.
46:42
To be honest, being at an Olympic Games or being at a big Games is my happy place.
46:47
Do you think, like you won a lot of European stuff, obviously the gold medal is... Yeah.
46:53
If you had only won a gold medal, would that...
46:57
It wouldn't have justified the time, effort, and how good I should have been.
47:04
But to be honest, the most pleasing thing that I'd done athletically is the fact that for nearly 10 years I was unbeaten.
47:14
Yes.
47:15
It was actually nine years.
47:17
Yeah.
47:17
Nine years, nine months and 17 days.
47:20
Three hours and six minutes.
47:24
But I think that for me is a better gauge of how good I was.
47:32
Do you think you could have been bitter?
47:33
I think I could have...
47:36
Better.
47:37
I think I could have been better.
47:38
Do you?
47:39
Well, no, I think- Not in the way you trained.
47:41
We didn't train like then those days.
47:43
No.
47:44
That's one of the things I don't understand about nowadays, not back then, because they didn't know so much.
47:49
But I don't understand nowadays when
47:51
team things why you don't do more stuff in much smaller groups and more specific stuff whereas most people do most of the things together yeah and i just think if you're in if you're in different positions and stuff then i don't understand why they don't do more individual
48:11
They do less contact now.
48:13
Right.
48:13
Is it because you have a squad of 30 and the S&C guys just don't have the time to?
48:19
They train twice a day.
48:20
We never train twice a day.
48:21
No.
48:23
Less contact.
48:24
I think they're doing it better.
48:24
I think data and all that is paying more of a role.
48:28
Like in our day, data was never used.
48:30
No.
48:31
We were lucky if we got to be able to film stuff and watch it in slow motion four days later.
48:38
So when you, after that, you retired after that?
48:42
In 90, because I kept going for it.
48:43
Yeah, yeah.
48:44
Just trying to get healthy.
48:45
Hard to let go, because it's hard to let go.
48:47
Do you know, and you can tell me if it's the same in rugby, but there comes a point in, at least in my training regime and all that kind of stuff, when you know your performances are not going to necessarily get better, you're not training quite as hard, but you're still performing,
49:08
at a very high level.
49:09
And so it's actually, it's quite easy now.
49:13
And you're still with your mates.
49:16
You're still doing the thing you love.
49:17
And you haven't got lots of money.
49:19
And you were making money in those days?
49:21
Just started to.
49:22
Just started to.
49:23
Because money sort of came into it in about sort of 82, 83, 84.
49:27
Okay.
49:28
But like rugby, started very low.
49:30
Yes.
49:31
And, you know, now they make hundreds of thousands.
49:33
Back then, we were making two or three thousands.
49:36
Right.
49:36
Okay.
49:37
And when you finally finished, how did you deal with that?
49:42
Was that hard?
49:44
Yeah.
49:44
Letting go mentally?
49:46
Yeah, no, absolutely.
49:47
Absolutely, because I think that I'd been doing it literally every day for 15 years.
49:54
And one Monday morning, you wake up and you think...
49:56
Oh, what am I going to do today?
49:58
Because the great thing about sports and particularly athletics, because that's what I really know, is that you rarely think about what you're going to do next.
50:08
All you're thinking about is throwing the shot further or long jumping further.
50:13
How can I do that?
50:14
And so you're always kind of in there.
50:15
You never think about retirement and all that kind of stuff.
50:19
Well, I didn't anyway.
50:20
But you had Lucozade?
50:22
Yeah.
50:23
You had Lucozade then?
50:23
Yeah, I had Lucozade then.
50:25
I had Adidas.
50:26
I had Hertz.
50:27
And tell me about the Game Boy game.
50:30
Oh, yes.
50:31
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
50:32
Daily's Decathlon.
50:33
Daily's Decathlon.
50:34
Everyone I've spoken to has said I'm doing a podcast.
50:36
Oh, Daily's Decathlon.
50:38
Daily's Decathlon.
50:39
It was really funny because there were hardly any games or anything back in 84 or whenever it was.
50:47
And these people called Ocean Software got in touch and said, we're doing this and we'd like to make a decathlon game and all that kind of thing.
50:55
So I said, yeah, happy to do it.
50:57
And I thought to myself, oh, these things are never going to take off.
51:04
And the funny thing is, so since 1984, I don't reckon there's been a single day when somebody hasn't come and mentioned it.
51:11
I told Ned at Laureus that we were doing the podcast, he said, oh, Daly's decathlon.
51:16
He said, I used to play it as a kid.
51:18
And he said, if you scroll really quickly, it can make you run faster.
51:22
That's it, or put your finger with a sock on it and you can go across the keys.
51:27
Honestly, I cannot believe how many people must have bought that.
51:32
And I wish I'd had a quid for everyone that has bought it or mentioned it to me at least.
51:37
So what are you doing now, other than the time we spend together at Laureus?
51:43
To be honest, I've got a couple of projects that I'm trying to put together.
51:48
And so just doing those and having a few meetings.
51:52
But mostly just around for my kids.
51:57
I've got two young boys.
51:59
They're young, they're young.
52:00
19 and 24.
52:02
And so, you know, I try and spend a bit of time with them and occasionally spend some time with my older kids.
52:07
And so other than that, you know, one who's a British champion used to be used to be absolutely.
52:13
But he's moved to Canada.
52:14
So he's that's amazing.
52:17
Give you a sense of pride when he when he became the British decathlete champion.
52:22
It gave me a sense of pride because I knew how hard, well, I think I knew how hard it must have been for him kind of getting there because it's really difficult to be the son or daughter of somebody who's been really good at something because everybody expects so much from you.
52:42
And that kind of, I suspect, turns most kids off.
52:46
But he's managed to do it.
52:48
He won that three times.
52:50
Yeah.
52:50
Yeah.
52:50
Wow, that's amazing, isn't it?
52:51
Yeah.
52:52
Oh, yeah.
52:53
He's a good kid.
52:54
Yeah.
52:55
He really is.
52:56
Do you think you had tough times growing up?
52:58
No, because everybody else was in the same boat as, you know.
53:01
That's what I reckon.
53:02
Sometimes, you know, you couldn't have the fire on because you couldn't afford the electricity or the gas.
53:09
Yeah.
53:09
You know, but we always had meals and we were always reasonably warm and...
53:14
and dry and all that kind of stuff.
53:16
But every single person that I knew, other families, were all exactly the same.
53:21
Do you think of most people that have been successful have had something in their early life that has driven them to be successful?
53:30
Yeah.
53:30
That emotional intelligence is something that switches them on?
53:34
Or...
53:36
they've had tough times or they haven't had a lot.
53:39
Yeah.
53:39
Which, you know, we didn't have a lot, but we had a, you know, a mother and father that wanted us to be successful in terms of whatever we did.
53:49
Yeah, no, absolutely.
53:51
We used to go to work.
53:51
We have to every holidays, we have to go to work.
53:54
We had to mow lawns.
53:54
On the farm.
53:55
Yeah, we'll mow lawns or just, you know, just do something to, you know, be able to afford a rugby ball.
54:01
Yeah.
54:01
No, listen, listen.
54:02
Absolutely.
54:03
I remember
54:05
I remember my brother, he had jobs from when he was 13 or 14, whether it was a paper round or work with a milkman.
54:17
Life was a bit different then.
54:19
And I think that it made us more robust.
54:24
Yeah, I think so.
54:25
I think it made us more robust and a bit more determined to be in charge of our lives.
54:32
I like, like I sort of try and keep an eye on the All Blacks, rugby in general.
54:39
Do you think they are mentally as tough as, like in your sport, as it was in our day?
54:45
No, I don't think so.
54:46
Do you think they're a bit softer?
54:47
Yeah.
54:47
I don't know if you'd call it softer, but they definitely don't train as hard.
54:53
I remember that.
54:54
No, I think they train more scientifically now, but obviously we didn't have the science then.
54:58
Yeah.
55:00
But I think we were much, yeah, tougher.
55:05
Yeah.
55:06
I think tougher, grittier.
55:08
Yeah.
55:09
Do you think you would survive in today's world?
55:12
The question is, would the others be able to survive with me?
55:18
Because I'll have to know, you know, in today's game, I think I'd be okay.
55:22
Yeah, I don't know.
55:23
Go on.
55:23
I'm sort of, I'm just wondering whether they have that mental toughness like we had.
55:28
No, but wouldn't that make you better than them?
55:30
Or at least it's been.
55:32
I was just so focused on being the best I could be.
55:36
Yeah.
55:37
And making sure that I handed the jersey back in a better place than when I found it.
55:41
Yeah.
55:42
Because it means so much to me.
55:43
Right.
55:43
And it's a responsibility.
55:45
And I think it's, you know, today I've...
55:48
I assume they have the same passion.
55:50
And I think with the All Blacks, it's quite different because they could play somewhere else for more money.
55:57
So straight away, it's telling me they're there for the right reasons.
56:00
Yeah, absolutely.
56:01
But you would have made it.
56:02
I'll tell you why you would have made it.
56:04
Because I believe...
56:06
It may or may not be true, that if you've been really good in whatever your era is, you would still be good now.
56:14
How good?
56:16
We don't know, but we know that you'd still be really good.
56:20
Would you be the best guy still?
56:22
No, maybe not.
56:23
Or maybe.
56:24
Or maybe.
56:25
Yeah.
56:25
No, because you would have done, you'd be doing some different things, like they do now.
56:29
Yeah, yeah.
56:30
But your mentality means that you would have scrambled over most of them anyway.
56:34
Yes.
56:35
Thank you, Daly.
56:36
Oh, surely.
56:36
I love you.
56:37
You think when you meet your heroes, everyone says this to you, you always sort of, like when I met you in Monaco.
56:42
Yeah.
56:43
It was just like perfectly.
56:44
And you, Steve Waugh, Ian Botham.
56:48
So it was quite interesting because we're all the team sport guys all sort of stuck together.
56:52
So whether it be the cricket guys, the football guys, and then you.
56:59
But that was... Because it's true though.
57:01
Like Edwin would be Edwin.
57:03
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
57:04
But you were very much part of that sort of team culture.
57:06
And that's because...
57:08
I just like winning.
57:10
And I don't care if I'm an individual or in a team.
57:12
I will always do my best to ensure that we win.
57:16
And if that means being in the background and helping somebody else, I am more than happy.
57:22
Thank you.
57:22
No, thank you.
57:23
This is really good fun.
57:24
You've inspired many young people.
57:27
This was the attitude of winning.
57:29
But fantastic.
57:30
Thank you.
57:30
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