With three WTCS medals last season, Beth Potter had a great 2022. Throw in her bronze medal at the Commonwealth Games and she possibly had as good a year as she could have hoped.
However, the highs of the past year precipitated a mirroring low over the winter. Sickness proved a problem. Contracting COVID at the WTCS Final in Abu Dhabi undermined her race and perhaps cost her third place in the 2022 Series.
Then a bout of flu in January put her out of action too.
Amidst the turbulence of illness and recovery, she also endured struggles with motivation.
After such a successful 2022 she wanted to get back into training and prove to herself and others that she could sustain her success. In what was already a short off-season, she barely skipped a beat. She had a token rest but then got straight back into the work without really building back up.
“I felt the pressure to get back into training quite quickly,” admitted Potter. “I did have a break but it was on my mind that racing was around the corner again.”
Amid the interplay of internal pressure and wobbles in motivation, she experienced challenging self-doubt.
Over the winter, Potter has managed to grapple with that challenge. She has worked with a sport psychologist and has focused on being able to compartmentalise where necessary.
A corner was turned on training camp in Spain as she enjoyed a good three week block of training. Of course, thoughts cannot simply be turned off and on at will but the training gave her great confidence in her swimming and biking.
Coming into Abu Dhabi, “I thought I’d be in the top-5 and part of me thought I could be on the podium.”
A good swim at the race helped her into the front pack but she attributed being switched on in T1 as being vital to making the breakaway. Had she been a couple of seconds slower in the water she might have missed it. Her technical skills in T1 were thus crucial in maximising the small window that had opened.
Potter (no relation to her namesake, Harry) has been a front pack swimmer for a while and has often travelled under the radar.
Once she made the breakaway, she knew she was in contention. And yet, Abu Dhabi perhaps encapsulated the somewhat confusing space Potter now inhabits.
An Olympian for Great Britain in the 10,000m at the Rio Olympics, Potter unofficially broke the world record in the 5km last year. A consequence of her running background has been that she has sometimes been written off as purely a runner. Although she knew her ability, others did not believe.
The perception over her swim is one thing. The more curious element is the narrative surrounding her run, or rather the lack thereof.
For someone so credentialed in the run, that part of her skillset is often undervalued. Even in Abu Dhabi, when going by personal bests Potter was objectively the fastest runner in the breakaway, there was no sense that she was the prohibitive favourite.
On the other end of the scale, there was lots of negative talk in the early years of her switch to triathlon. Some said she would not swim or bike fast enough, or that if she did she would inevitably run slower than expected. Some of those doubts have persisted.
Her training partners have circled the wagons and helped her through the external negative chatter. Nevertheless, such external doubt cannot be easy to deal with.
Yet Potter dealt with it to perfection as she cruised to victory.
After four medals in her past six WTCS races, she is now fully aware she belongs at the absolute peak of the sport. She credited a lot of her rise to how much she raced last year.
“I’ve accelerated my development. I’ve done two or three seasons of racing in one and I needed that.”
At the same time, she also acknowledged that racing so many times may in part have contributed to her motivation difficulties this winter.
Now she has ten weeks until WTCS Yokohama to push on and consolidate her fast start.
Training with the Brownlee brothers has been a boon. In particular, Alistair Brownlee’s pushing on the bike was a great help for the breakaway in Abu Dhabi.
Having run 80 mile weeks when competing in athletics, she now does not need such high volume. Instead, much of her base comes from training on the bike. One of the benefits of this approach is that it restricts the scope for injury. The other preventative element is the gym.
Potter’s strength training, though, has progressed from injury prevention to a focus on more single leg power production. With the rate Potter has been improving across the board in the past 12 months, expect a big deadlift PB soon.
Indeed, strength training “has gone from one of my least favourite sessions of the week to one of my favourites”.
Potter admitted that she has not yet thought about the world title this year.
Anyone that would discount her, though, will need to think again. She is rapidly becoming one of the most formidable prospects on the circuit.
Having started 2023 perfectly, Beth Potter is showing no signs of slowing anytime soon.
