31 December 2023 , 15:59
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Seonaid McIntosh had to overcome an identity crisis to get back on top of the shooting world in time for the Olympic Games.
The most successful British female rifle shooter of all time, the 27-year-old has put two difficult years behind her to rediscover her best form in 2023. It took time for McIntosh to recover from her Olympic debut in Tokyo, in which she missed out on the finals in both the 10m air rifle and the 50m rifle 3 positions.
There was disappointment at the time, but with two years to reflect, McIntosh now understands the mental toll that those Games, as well as the Covid pandemic, had taken on her. She explained: “I think I didn’t realise how much weight had been put on (mentally) until after the fact. I think I just got more and more stressed.
“It wasn’t necessarily stressed outwardly, but I was getting more anxious and stressed and a wee bit of depression as well.
“I didn’t realise until after the fact when I tried to go back to normal and it was suddenly ‘I’m not back to normal’. Trying to fit that me into a normal setting was a case of a square peg and a round hole.
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“That is the point at which I realised I wasn’t ok,” she continued. “I realised that I didn’t have much confidence in my shooting and I was trying my best to get that back but again, I think that was something I grabbed onto as something I could focus on in an effort to ignore everything else that was going on.
“I don’t think I realised how much pressure there was added on because of that until much later.
“I spoke to a couple of therapists that I got referred to through my sports psychologist. I chatted to them and it was really about trusting in myself and learning how to do that again, which did help. Over time, I got myself back to myself.
Seonaid McIntosh of Team Great Britain during the 10m Air Rifle Women's event on day one of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics“To begin with, I guess it was a bit of an identity crisis, I wasn’t sure who I was, especially because I had that confidence piece, I had the confidence in my shooting, I had this mojo, this piece of magic and that is the thing that lets me shoot as well as I do.
“The Games and in the aftermath of that, I was asking: ‘Does that exist? Did it ever exist? Is it in my head? Is that real or have I made it up?’. I really struggled to trust myself and whether it was there or if it was a fabrication. So it took a while to learn that again.”
McIntosh is one of over 1,000 elite athletes on UK Sport’s National Lottery-funded World Class Programme, allowing them to train full time, have access to the world’s best coaches and benefit from pioneering medical support – this is vital for her pathway to Paris.
A succession of illnesses in 2022 did not help that healing process, with McIntosh admitting that by trying to push through each ailment, she did not give her body the necessary time to recover.
She has changed that this year, to great effect, winning World Cup titles in Cairo and Baku, the former helping her to the top of the world rankings in the air rifle.
McIntosh won European silver in March to qualify Team GB a quota place for Paris 2024. She took bronze at her third European Games in June with a British record score, which she improved again earlier this month.
Cutting back on part-time jobs, which would build up whenever she was away competing, has also helped, as has meeting boyfriend Grant at the end of last year.
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Explaining what she has changed, McIntosh said: “I’ve had a bit more focus on me, it sounds really obvious. I’ve had more focus on trying to rest and heal, physically and mentally. I spent quite a lot of last year just trying to push through and hoping it would go away. I don’t think that often works.
“I’ve been describing this year as the ‘Year of Health’, getting better and getting well. I also met my boyfriend back in December, and he has had a huge part to play in me feeling better in general. He has really inspired me to be better and be my best self. He’s played a big role.”
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