Despite a career-threatening car accident before the Athens Olympics, Jamie Costin never lost his love for the gruelling 50km walk, and recently reclaimed his Irish record, writes IAN O'RIORDAN

MY EARLIEST sporting memory is being woken up in the middle of the night to watch John Treacy in the Olympic marathon in Los Angeles in 1984. Being from Waterford, John was a local hero, and my father, who was a good runner back in the 1960s, would have known him when he first emerged.

I grew up in the Ring Gaeltacht, and John grew up not too far away, in Villierstown. Fr Michael Enright started up the Ring running club, and my father got involved with that, and would have driven John to some races in the early days.

So my parents travelled to Los Angeles, and I was sent off to my auntie’s house in Tullamore. There were about 10 of us youngsters in the house, and we were all shouting madly for John. I was already big into athletics by then, even at age seven, and seeing John win the Olympic silver that night was a great inspiration. He was as tenacious and as hard as they come.

Seán Kelly was also doing great in the cycling around that time, and we saw him as a local hero too. I still think he was the toughest man to ever ride a bike. I’d watch Seán on television every chance I got but like a lot of youngsters I was into nearly every sport at the time. Athletics, football, hurling, and whatever else was in season.

When I started secondary school in Dungarvan CBS at age 12 I started playing more hurling. I was very small for my age, and it was third year before I got on to the team. The likes of Dan Shanahan, Dave Bennett, Ken McGrath and a lot of other Waterford hurlers are around the same age and were coming onto the county scene, and I would have played against them regularly.

One of my best days in hurling was when I came up against Dan, who was playing for Lismore. He was a huge fella even back then, and I was this small little wing back. It was hard enough just to keep with the man, but I held him to five or six points from the wing. That was the highlight of my career in hurling. But I’ve always enjoyed the game, especially playing wing back. You get the freedom to run and roam, and that’s what I liked.

I still get to as many of Waterford’s championship matches as I can. Unfortunately the only one I got to see last year was the All-Ireland final. But I’ve no doubt those boys will be back. There is too much class in that team to leave it lie where it is, and I’m sure come the summer they’ll get their stuff back together and we’ll see some good performances.

I still see Dan around. I’m based in Dublin now but was home for Easter, and was out training on the roads when Dan drove by in his truck, hooting his horn. The Prendergasts of Ardmore also live about four miles out the road. They’re also farmers, and we’d have taken them on in hurling a few times as well. Athletics though was always my main sport. I ran cross-country as well during the winter, but mostly to stay fit. I was 12 when I won my first All-Ireland in race walking, and realised then that walking where my talent lay.

My first international was at the English AAA’s. My father drove us over. That was my first taste of real competition, and I loved it. Soon afterwards I competed in the European Juniors in 1995, and the following year, 1996, finished 12th in the World Juniors. That really set me on my way. The only problem was there wasn’t any great structure for race walking at the time. There was very little support, and I ended up getting a lot of injuries. I was trying hard but not making great progress.

Then in 1999 I went training to New Zealand, with Piece O’Callaghan. That was the start of becoming more professional, and out of that I got to qualify for the Sydney Olympics in 2000. By then I was full-time into the sport, travelling around the world. Race walking is certainly not a glamorous lifestyle, where you make a lot of money, but I enjoyed the training, especially as it got more professional.

If I had to single out another big influence on my career it would have to be Robert Korzeniowski, from Poland, who is unquestionably the greatest race walker of all time. He’s the four-time Olympic gold medallist. He won the 20km in Atlanta, the 20km and 50km in Sydney, and the 50km in Athens. That’s something that will never be repeated.

In 2001, with Rob Heffernan, I got in contact with Korzeniowski, and we were lucky enough to train with him in South Africa. We got on very well and he brought a whole new dimension to the term “professional” athlete. Everything was accounted for with him, and it really helped me. I went training with him around the world in 2003, and probably spent more time with him than he did his wife.

He came to our farm in Waterford for a week in January 2004, and then we trained in Mexico for six weeks, and also Poland and France. It was an amazing learning experience, to rub shoulders with someone who has achieved the highest success in his event. Korzeniowski was very open with his knowledge, and what it meant to prepare properly.

So I felt I was brilliantly prepared for the Athens Olympics, before disaster struck – and the infamous car accident a few days before my event. It took me six months to come out of the body cast and get off crutches, but I was two years just trying to get fit again.

There were tough times, but the one overriding ambition I had was to get back to a high level, to compete again. During that time I also qualified in sports massage. That was another avenue which opened up for me through sport, and gave me something for the long term. I’d learned so much about the subject along the way anyway and always enjoyed trying to help other athletes help themselves.

Qualifying for the Beijing Olympics, I felt, would bring closure to the whole Athens experience, and I was determined to finish that day no matter what. I wasn’t able to perform at my best, and it was only afterwards, when I got to participate in a study on hydration at the Australian Institute of Sport, that I finally discovered my body has a very hard time maintaining proper water levels in extreme heat.

That helped me realise my problem was physical, not psychological. I feel I can better control the hydration issue now, the evidence being when I walked 3:50.52, almost two minutes quicker than before, when reclaiming the Irish record in Slovakia at the end of March. I finally felt revitalised again for the next chapter.

I still feel as well I haven’t proved myself at a major championship, and that’s the next step. I never wanted to be looking back in 10 years wondering “what if?” I’m 31 now, but that’s not particularly old in race walking, so I’ll go to the world championships in Berlin in August and see what happens after that. London isn’t too far away, but sport has already given me so much, and I feel so privileged, that I’ve been working with some junior walkers coming through as well, because I do want to give something back to the next generation. That, to me, is part of what sport is about.