:00:10. > :00:15.It is time for HARDtalk. -- behead. The official Olympic creed says it
:00:15. > :00:18.is not the winning that counts but the taking part. Try telling that
:00:18. > :00:23.to the elite professional athletes and coaches who have dedicated
:00:23. > :00:27.their lives to the quest for gold medals. With the London Games less
:00:27. > :00:33.than 100 days away, my guest is Peter Keen - performance director
:00:33. > :00:42.for UK Sport. In Beijing he helped deliver a record medal haul for
:00:42. > :00:52.Team GB. In London, the aim is to do even better. But has the cult of
:00:52. > :01:17.
:01:17. > :01:20.Peter Keen, welcome to HARDtalk. Maybe it is time to turn the old
:01:20. > :01:30.Olympic mantra around. Maybe it is not the taking part that matters,
:01:30. > :01:36.
:01:36. > :01:39.it is the winning. Is that true? Fascinating question. I think the
:01:39. > :01:43.truth behind both of these perspectives is that it is actually
:01:43. > :01:53.the journey. The greatest appeal and reward of sporting endeavour is
:01:53. > :01:54.
:01:54. > :01:58.the journey you went on to be that person. What the Olympic movement
:01:58. > :02:08.is about is striving to be the best you can be and the best in that
:02:08. > :02:10.
:02:10. > :02:13.context is the champion. Not everyone makes it. When that
:02:14. > :02:16.journey is the right one, it is taken on in the right way. Whenever
:02:16. > :02:21.someone reaches their limits, that is often an extremely positive
:02:21. > :02:25.experience for that individual. It is never all about the gold. But
:02:25. > :02:31.the notion of taking part without the aspiration to be the best is
:02:31. > :02:36.not being truly honest to the spirit of sport. When you talk
:02:36. > :02:39.about the spirit of sport, I get the sense that you feel it is no
:02:39. > :02:43.longer adequate to have the old Corinthian approach and simply say,
:02:43. > :02:53.I will heroically try against all odds to do something, even if I do
:02:53. > :02:58.
:02:58. > :03:02.not see it as a life and death matter. That might have been the
:03:02. > :03:08.attitude of many British athletes 20 years ago. Is that not good
:03:08. > :03:16.enough? It is a sort of technical knockout. It is a choice that has
:03:16. > :03:18.been taken away by the movement itself. To be at the Olympics for
:03:18. > :03:25.any sport requires a qualification process which absolutely tests
:03:25. > :03:30.athletes to the limit. In effect, those who get the opportunity to
:03:30. > :03:38.get there are already world-class. The idea that nations can nominate
:03:38. > :03:47.somebody they like is not an option. The nature of the competition is
:03:47. > :03:57.established before the Games start. In many disciplines, the numbers of
:03:57. > :04:03.
:04:03. > :04:08.competitors are fewer than the numbers mentioned. -- numbers of
:04:08. > :04:12.nations. That sets the tone we're talking about. When I look at the
:04:12. > :04:15.way you have talked and written about what you do with the elite
:04:15. > :04:19.athletes, it strikes me that you use the language of business as
:04:19. > :04:22.much as sport. You talk about systems, analysis of data, you use
:04:22. > :04:32.the phrase "performance pathways". It seems as if you are more Harvard
:04:32. > :04:35.business school then the training ground. Part of it is a business.
:04:35. > :04:42.The language you're picking up on and the citations you are making
:04:42. > :04:45.are part of the story, but not the whole. The business side of it is a
:04:45. > :04:48.reflection of the fact that in Olympic sport, the reality of the
:04:48. > :04:51.modern Games is that success is dependent not just on the
:04:51. > :04:55.individual but the support of their nation in terms of investing in
:04:55. > :05:00.training, preparation, facilities. There are many requirements that
:05:00. > :05:09.somebody has to resource. Inevitably, governments and public
:05:09. > :05:13.agencies fund the programmes. talking huge sums of money. People
:05:13. > :05:23.might be amazed to know that in the UK, since we're the host nation,
:05:23. > :05:35.
:05:35. > :05:41.�500 million has been spent on elite sport. It is a very
:05:41. > :05:51.significant sum of money. It is probably best thought of as going
:05:51. > :05:51.
:05:51. > :05:54.towards the individual cost. For an elite athlete to eat, sleep and
:05:54. > :06:04.breathe their sport, travel the world, access the equipment they
:06:04. > :06:11.need. When you add up the costs, they come to around �60,000 per
:06:11. > :06:17.year for each athlete. A lot of this money comes straight from the
:06:17. > :06:20.taxpayer. Can that be justified? This Olympics has coincided with an
:06:20. > :06:30.era of austerity in the industrialised world. Can this be
:06:30. > :06:32.
:06:32. > :06:42.justified? Let's put it into perspective. The majority of the
:06:42. > :06:43.
:06:43. > :06:46.budget was funded by the National Lottery. It is not technically
:06:46. > :06:56.Exchequer funding from the Government. But it is not all
:06:56. > :07:03.
:07:03. > :07:06.lottery funding. Since London got the Games, it has been enhanced by
:07:06. > :07:10.Exchequer funding from the Government. It is a relatively
:07:10. > :07:15.small sum in the scheme of things in terms of total GDP. But let's go
:07:15. > :07:18.back to the notion of the business of sport. If, as a nation, we want
:07:18. > :07:22.to see our best sportspeople have the best chance of winning, there
:07:22. > :07:29.is a cost to doing that. The bigger cost is for the individual in their
:07:29. > :07:35.life. The business side is in a sense non-negotiable. You need a
:07:35. > :07:43.pool if you are a swimmer. You need to travel to meets around the world.
:07:43. > :07:53.Somebody has to pay for that. We need the right resources for the
:07:53. > :08:04.
:08:04. > :08:07.right individual. It is a brutal and bloody business. In essence,
:08:07. > :08:10.you are saying to some sportspeople, "You're just not world class and we
:08:10. > :08:14.can't put money into you." You must ruthlessly back winners. Table
:08:14. > :08:24.tennis for example, you were not happy that the players would ever
:08:24. > :08:26.
:08:26. > :08:32.be at the very top so you withdrew 15% of their funding. -- 50%. The
:08:32. > :08:35.coach left, saying his players were demoralised. To be precise, all the
:08:35. > :08:38.sports preparing for London received what we felt was the
:08:38. > :08:48.optimal funding to move from the level of performance they were at
:08:48. > :08:53.
:08:53. > :08:57.to the level they could be in London. There are differences. The
:08:57. > :09:00.reality of the scenario you have described is that the deal with our
:09:00. > :09:05.Government was not one they could see through in terms of the
:09:05. > :09:09.changing income. We were very clear before we set out on this journey
:09:09. > :09:14.that if the resources did not materialise down the line, we would
:09:14. > :09:19.cut from the bottom up in terms of priority and the opportunity to win.
:09:19. > :09:29.Every sport knew that before we started. Hard though it is, it is a
:09:29. > :09:32.
:09:32. > :09:35.very strong meritocracy. You might perceive this as ruthless but it is
:09:35. > :09:45.honest to the business of high- performance sport. We are aspiring
:09:45. > :09:51.
:09:51. > :09:55.to win. It seems that it is not just about isolating particular
:09:55. > :09:59.sports. You are clearly excited with your cycling background about
:09:59. > :10:02.the potential of British cycling and British swimming. But it is not
:10:02. > :10:07.just about isolating the sport where things are coming together,
:10:07. > :10:17.but the individuals. Have you thought through the messages you
:10:17. > :10:19.
:10:19. > :10:22.are giving to these elite sports people? It seems as though you and
:10:22. > :10:31.other top administrators looking to burnish our Olympic record treat
:10:31. > :10:34.the athletes as automatons. I would argue that what motivates me in my
:10:34. > :10:44.role are the experiences of coaching individuals for over a
:10:44. > :10:49.
:10:49. > :10:53.decade. This is in cycling? cycling. Working on a daily basis
:10:53. > :10:59.with people in an area where there was no public funding, through to
:10:59. > :11:02.the National Lottery revolution in the 90s, to where we are today. I
:11:02. > :11:12.hope I have never lost sight of the reality of someone pursuing that
:11:12. > :11:19.
:11:19. > :11:22.dream. Some attain success but some do not get to where they want to be.
:11:22. > :11:26.I'm leading up to this, an honest dialogue has always been necessary
:11:26. > :11:34.about where somebody is at and where they are going. This is the
:11:34. > :11:44.approach we have to take. If we're not looking at the realities of
:11:44. > :11:49.
:11:49. > :11:53.each individual athlete, we're not being honest. It's like a football
:11:53. > :11:57.team. Somebody has to make the decision of who is on the bench and
:11:57. > :12:01.who is on the field. If you're doing that right, you're picking
:12:01. > :12:04.people on merit. What did you make of the words that came from the
:12:04. > :12:14.diving performance director who was talking about Tom Daley he said, he
:12:14. > :12:18.
:12:18. > :12:22.seemed distracted. He was too much in front of the media, not working
:12:22. > :12:25.hard enough in the pool. And he said the Chinese work much harder.
:12:25. > :12:31.They restrict their athletes much more and he said he supported that
:12:31. > :12:37.approach. He is speaking to a fairly obvious cultural difference
:12:37. > :12:44.between nations. Should we be more like them? You have talked a lot
:12:44. > :12:48.about medal targets. You want to beat the 47 medals Britain won in
:12:48. > :12:57.Beijing and you think we can better it. You want to get closer to where
:12:57. > :13:01.the Chinese are. Should we adopt their methods? Absolutely not. Not
:13:01. > :13:04.because I have a negative view of them but because I believe
:13:04. > :13:08.profoundly in winning on our terms, in something that feels culturally
:13:09. > :13:12.right for the UK. The sense of individual choice and opportunity
:13:12. > :13:16.on merit is very important in our approach. A degree of
:13:16. > :13:26.professionalism we are seeking is in many ways motivated by what I
:13:26. > :13:27.
:13:27. > :13:32.see in other fields of endeavour, particularly the performance arts.
:13:32. > :13:37.If we look at the pathway to The Royal Ballet or a leading school of
:13:37. > :13:46.music, these have systems. They are well funded and they are developed
:13:46. > :13:56.on merit. There is an expectation that at the end, you will be world
:13:56. > :13:57.
:13:57. > :14:05.class. If you make it as an elite sports person and win a gold medal,
:14:05. > :14:10.as a former top UK decathlon said, any who wins cold this summer will
:14:10. > :14:17.be, made for life. Isn't it harder in that context to deliver the
:14:17. > :14:22.discipline, the total rigour that you might need? I think we have to
:14:22. > :14:27.challenge some of the mythology there. The reality for many
:14:27. > :14:33.Olympians is not that it makes you for life at all in financial terms.
:14:33. > :14:38.I would hope the experience they went on and the experience they had
:14:38. > :14:44.changes them for life. But the reality I can talk of is that often
:14:44. > :14:49.the two years after the win in the majority of sports is a difficult
:14:49. > :14:54.time. It is not a pot of gold in that sense. To get the endorsements,
:14:54. > :14:59.the sponsorship, that might lead to significant wealth is very hard
:14:59. > :15:04.work. It is also distracting. It asks you to do things you don't
:15:04. > :15:08.like doing, or compromise your training. It is often difficult and
:15:08. > :15:16.are rarely does it led to the source of wealth being implied by
:15:16. > :15:20.Many top athletes are getting distracted, is that the case?
:15:20. > :15:23.is a risk. One of the many benefits of the system that we have been
:15:23. > :15:26.talking about today that has resulted from the scale of
:15:26. > :15:29.investment that you have raised is that there is a level of
:15:29. > :15:39.professionalism, and I don't just mean the quality of the individuals,
:15:39. > :15:40.
:15:40. > :15:43.that actually manages these things effectively. The headlines are
:15:43. > :15:49.compelling but the reality of the daily life of most of our athletes
:15:50. > :15:56.is that it is pretty monastic, pretty thorough. Those risks are
:15:56. > :16:04.known. There is a lot of risk and there is work going on to mitigate
:16:04. > :16:09.that. We want to optimise Britain's success. Do you want every top
:16:09. > :16:18.athlete to be available? I am thinking about the small handful of
:16:18. > :16:21.athletes who have been convicted of drugs offences in the past. People
:16:21. > :16:25.who have served their time. People who have served their bans under
:16:25. > :16:35.international sporting law. The British Olympic Association says
:16:35. > :16:37.
:16:37. > :16:41.they will not have drug cheats in the team. Do you want those
:16:42. > :16:50.individuals to be in the team? personal perspective on this is
:16:50. > :16:53.what I want above all is clarity and consistency of rules in sport.
:16:53. > :17:02.There must be rules that are clear and the belief that when people
:17:02. > :17:07.play by then the outcome is fair. But they have played by the rules
:17:07. > :17:10.because the outcome is fair. I am talking about David Millar. He has
:17:10. > :17:15.become a serious campaigner against doping in sport. Should he be part
:17:15. > :17:25.of the cycling team? At the individual level, it is very
:17:25. > :17:31.
:17:31. > :17:35.difficult to have a view that is balanced in the sense of... Can I
:17:35. > :17:40.come back to winning? You want to win. Presumably that means you want
:17:40. > :17:45.David Millar to be part of the cycling squad. Not as much as I
:17:45. > :17:50.want the rules to be clear. I think sport needs clarity of rules
:17:51. > :17:53.whenever it is possible. If you have the world anti-doping code
:17:53. > :17:56.clearly signed by the Olympic movement and all governing bodies,
:17:56. > :17:59.if that says that these are the penalties for doping offences and
:17:59. > :18:09.these are the consequences of them, those are the rules we should be
:18:09. > :18:12.playing by. Whatever the motivations are of different
:18:12. > :18:21.organisations, the danger is moving away from the bigger picture of
:18:21. > :18:24.what sport needs. I think what you are saying is you think the British
:18:24. > :18:29.Olympic Association is stretched too far in trying to make this a
:18:29. > :18:34.lifetime ban from the Olympics for British athletes. That is the legal
:18:34. > :18:39.opinion. Is it your opinion? It is certainly my view that the bigger
:18:39. > :18:46.picture here is to have consistency. If that means a lifetime ban across
:18:46. > :18:49.all sports, there is a process to establish that. If the current
:18:49. > :18:56.rules as they apply across the world of sport are clear, I think
:18:56. > :18:59.that is where we need to be. Clarity and consistency. Another
:18:59. > :19:03.big controversy right now when it comes to the British Olympic team
:19:03. > :19:06.and the team ethic is that there are a very large number of athletes
:19:06. > :19:09.in the British team who were not born in the United Kingdom, in some
:19:09. > :19:19.cases have very little long-term links to the United Kingdom and
:19:19. > :19:23.
:19:23. > :19:32.have been dubbed in some national newspapers as plastic Brits. I find
:19:32. > :19:34.this a little disturbing, if I am honest. It is a very dangerous line
:19:34. > :19:44.of reasoning, to speculate about individuals' motivations for coming
:19:44. > :19:46.
:19:46. > :19:52.to the UK. This will be an easy one to get a handle on. Tiffany Porter
:19:52. > :19:56.is a great athlete in the 100 metre hurdles. She wanted to compete for
:19:56. > :20:00.the United States. She is born in Michigan, raised in the United
:20:00. > :20:07.States. She has British and Nigerian parents. She tried to get
:20:07. > :20:11.into the US Olympic team in 2008 and failed. By 2010, she decided
:20:11. > :20:16.she wanted to run for Britain. She is entitled to because of her
:20:16. > :20:23.parents. Does it makes sense for her to be the team captain of the
:20:23. > :20:31.GB athletics team? We have to look at her eligibility and what
:20:31. > :20:35.determines it. Again, an argument about clarity of rules.
:20:35. > :20:42.technical as that. Not about emotion for you. The rules and
:20:42. > :20:45.whether you qualify. There are rules. If you had issues with the
:20:45. > :20:49.timing in which someone can change nationality, you should look at the
:20:49. > :20:55.rules. The second point is about the wisdom of her captaining the
:20:55. > :21:05.team. For me, that comes into the team in terms of the management of
:21:05. > :21:05.
:21:06. > :21:10.that and the views of the athletes. Was it wise? I was not there.
:21:10. > :21:14.know the athletes and it is part of your job to ensure they are happy.
:21:14. > :21:19.Do you think it was wise to appoint this particular woman to be team
:21:19. > :21:27.captain? If the dynamics that arose in that team, the beliefs they had,
:21:27. > :21:30.her leadership, if that enhances the team, it was the right call. If
:21:30. > :21:40.it is divisive and negative, regardless where it came from, then
:21:40. > :21:40.
:21:40. > :21:44.it is the wrong call. For me, if you are eligible, you are eligible.
:21:44. > :21:48.If it is the right call, it is the right call. It is more complicated
:21:48. > :21:51.than that because of the long-term implications. That brings us to the
:21:51. > :21:59.legacy of the game. Wrestling, four of the British squad are from the
:21:59. > :22:01.Ukraine. One is from Bulgaria. Here are the words of one British
:22:01. > :22:04.wrestler who is deeply unhappy about this, Mark Cocker, he says
:22:04. > :22:08."UK Sport funding by bringing these people to this country and making
:22:08. > :22:18.them part of the team is having the opposite effect of a positive
:22:18. > :22:18.
:22:18. > :22:28.legacy in our sport of wrestling. I had been in the sport for 17 years
:22:28. > :22:28.
:22:29. > :22:37.and it was much healthier before UK Sport came into it." It is a
:22:37. > :22:39.fascinating example. You're talking about consequence. There clearly is
:22:39. > :22:47.a point. The scenario where the individuals you describe were
:22:47. > :22:49.invited to the UK to come as training partners. It was about
:22:49. > :22:58.trying to raise the expectations and the standard of British
:22:59. > :23:07.wrestling. That is a risk. It is an opportunity to establish a level of
:23:07. > :23:11.expertise relevant to Olympic performance. We would not have had
:23:11. > :23:20.wrestlers qualifying by right to be at the Games if we had not done
:23:20. > :23:30.something to raise the standards. The training partners have chosen
:23:30. > :23:32.
:23:32. > :23:35.to stay here. A few succeed. If we do as well as you hope in the
:23:35. > :23:45.medals table, team GB in 2012, but the participation level continues
:23:45. > :23:46.
:23:46. > :23:54.to fall, will that be a success? Would it be a good legacy or a
:23:54. > :23:58.failed legacy for London 2012? think the connect between success
:23:58. > :24:05.in sport and the desire for people to do it is one in sport we
:24:05. > :24:10.fundamentally believe in. You think winning medals has a major impact
:24:10. > :24:15.on the wider sporting world? think it makes sport more visible
:24:15. > :24:19.to people than any other intervention that I can think of.
:24:19. > :24:21.The vast majority of Olympians that I have known will cite the vision
:24:21. > :24:27.of another person in the generation before them winning as the
:24:27. > :24:33.motivation for them to take up the sport. On an anecdotal level, it
:24:33. > :24:38.generates champions. The extent to which it drives people to take up