One sport seems to offer the perfect opportunity for some ESAA ‘leavers’ to try athletics on the trickier surface of ice – bobsleigh. As well as Jazmin Sawyers, who won a silver medal in the Olympic youth bobsleigh competition in 2012 in between her 4 ESAA titles and senior Commonwealth and European long jump medals, you’ll find 17 names from the leavers’ list who have become members of the British Bobsleigh team. Look at the famous faces section to find out about the ESAA leaver who became the first British woman to retain a Winter Olympic title in another sliding discipline.
One of Britain’s most versatile coaches started his career with a victory in the ESAA senior triple jump. You can read more about John Herbert’s impressive career as an athlete in the 1991 School Report section of the Road to Tokyo page but there’s much more to his cv than that. After competing in the 4-man bobsleigh at the 1994 Winter Olympics, John has pursued a successful coaching career in not one, but three sports.
His athletics protegees include long jumper Jade Johnson (2 ESAA titles, European and Commonwealth silver medallist) and Phillips Idowu (1 ESAA title, Olympic silver medallist, World, Commonwealth and European champion). Not content with that, John is now the performance coach for British Bobsleigh and works with fencers aiming for the next Olympic Games.