In their latest UK Sport podcast of Medals and More the UK Sport chair, Dame Katherine Grainger catches up with Team GB’s ‘Chef De Mission’ Mark England.
They discuss what the ‘chef’s’ role is, the impact, at the once unthinkable delay to an Olympics, is having on athletes and support staff and why its the case some British competitors still know they’ve been selected to represent Team GB, while others will have to wait til after lockdown to prove themselves.
Recorded after the announcement that Tokyo 2020 will now take place in 2021, Mark talks openly about what his role as Chef de Mission consists of, his personal highlight from his time as one of the most influential people in British high-performance sport and how the postponement has affected Team GB’s plans.
“We know the date of the opening ceremony, we know the date the athlete village opens, we know when we have to enter a team and it’s all within 24 hours plus a year to what it was in 2020. So in that regard it’s been a very simple operation.”
“But we have had to unravel hundreds of contracts to see whether our infrastructure in country can be replicated in Tokyo 2021 and that’s taken most of our time.”
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