Hillier’s mission to make Jyothi ‘double trouble’

Double-discipline athletes is the latest upgrade world athletics is currently witnessing.

While 100-200m, 200-400m were the most common of combinations, a hurdler’s quest of mastering a flat sprint event is the most sought after new trend.

It all began when World and Olympic 400m hurdles champion Karsten Warholm of Norway competed in the 400m race at the 2018 European Championships in Berlin.

That opened gates for a few others to follow suit. Tokyo Olympics women’s bronze medallist Femke Bol of Netherlands and Olympic champion and world record holder Sydney Mclaughlin of USA are among the elite women athletes who are 400m hurdlers running the 400m.

Closer home, Jyothi Yarraji is treading on a similar path, something no Asian has done before. The 23-year-old became the first Indian woman to break the 13-second barrier in the 100m hurdles before being crowned the 100m national champion. She has now taken the challenge a notch higher by adding 200m to her events list.

“I’m training her to become a world-class athlete who can do multiple events. It’s the way the sport is progressing,” claimed James Hillier, Jyothi’s coach and athletics director at the Reliance Foundation in Bhubaneswar.

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“Her priority will always be the hurdles. That’s her principal event. She has special qualities in terms of natural speed and speed endurance. We are making the best use of it,” he added while complimenting his ward’s gold in 100m hurdles followed by a silver in 200m at the recently concluded Asian Athletics Championships.

How then does this rare combo help Jyothi improve and excel in each?

“You want to train athletes for success not failure, right? I’m not training her to fail at 200m. I’m training her to succeed in it. Anything that she gets from 200m is going to help her in the hurdles. Confidence is one thing but Jyothi’s improved 200m run has helped her get better with the leg turnover in the hurdles. The speed at which she turns her legs is faster now. It’s also an opportunity for her to go out and win more medals,” explained the 45-year-old from Great Britain.

To avoid complicating the nuances of two completely different disciplines with contrasting characteristics, the coach adheres to making the mind strong to keep it simple.

“I have told her not to confuse the two. The minute she is done with the sprint hurdle event, she becomes a 200m runner. It’s about dealing with the race in front of you and forget the rest. Because the rhythm is different. That’s why this is such a difficult combination to do. A lot of people when they get to know this about Jyothi they go ‘how on earth is she doing it? That’s amazing!’,” he expressed with a tinge of pride.

The 2023 season is a busy one with big ticket events lined-up one after the other during which ‘peaking at the right time’ becomes the most important aspect.

“The process of peaking at the right time effectively begins on the first day of training in a season. We look at the competition we are aiming for and kind of work backwards. For us, we wanted to enter her peak at the ACC and maintain it at the World Championship and have a rebuild until the Asian Games. As a coach I manipulate the volumes and intensity to make the athlete - fastest, fittest and the freshest.”

For someone who began her athletic journey comparatively late than most of her peers, Jyothi’s association with Hillier has worked wonders so far. When questioned about the trick to producing quality athletes, Hilliar said: “I treat every athlete as a human being first. Yes, I put pressure on them but it’s the right kind of pressure without coming across as dictatorship.

“I try to educate and give them tools to think independently. We 100% trust each other and are honest. If she isn’t happy with the programme, she will tell me and vice versa. A student’s feedback is very important for me to be good at my job. Ultimately I’m the boss but it’s very much a partnership,” he offered.

Speaking about the Reliance Foundation, Hillier had a word of appreciation for them investing in the future of Indian athletics and betting on it's unlocked potential.

"None of this would be possible if not for their vision. I'm happy to be getting an opportunity to make an impact for the future of Indian athletics. What we do here sends shockwaves across the country. We have a responsibility not only for our athletes at the academy but to everybody in the fraternity across India.

"I feel what we do kind of sets a benchmark for the rest to copy and push their limits. Jyothi won the 100m hurdles Nations in 2019 with a timing of 13.9s, now there are 5-6 athletes who run 13.6s so the event has moved on and she has pulled others along with her. That's what I like what the Foundation is doing, taking the sport to newer heights organically," signed-off Hillier.