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Paris 2024: David Smith ‘rips up the rulebook’ in bid for boccia gold
Three-time Paralympic champion finds the fun in competing again ahead of his fifth Games 20 Mar 2024
Despite causing the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games to be postponed by a year, the Covid-19 pandemic couldn’t have come at a better time for Great Britain's three-time Paralympic champion David Smith.
“I was feeling fed up with boccia,” Smith said of the sport, which is one of only two sports in the Paris 2024 Paralympic programme without an Olympic counterpart.
“The lack of recognition, winning everything and not having much to show for it, and I was going through a divorce. There were many factors where my mind probably wasn’t as strong as it could have been.
"Tokyo 2020 was around the corner, and I wasn’t really looking forward to it. Then lockdown hit and it gave me respite, a chance to not do anything for three months, ignore the sport and just focus on myself."
Smith, who was diagnosed with cerebral palsy at age of one, reviewed his diet during the lockdown. “When I wasn’t in competition I probably wasn’t looking after myself because I was so busy, head down,” he said.
“I would skip breakfast, have a cheese toastie or something convenient for lunch, which wasn’t the best, and I wouldn’t drink enough. I was getting into bad habits then expecting the body to function while training hard. It’s fine in your 20s because your body can shrug it off.
“I wasn’t expecting much, because I thought ‘I’m already fit and healthy, it’s not going to make that much difference’ – how naïve. But a couple of weeks into having a balanced breakfast, balanced lunch, hydrating properly, working out at the right time … I was sleeping better, my gut health improved, my toileting habits improved by 30 percent, my energy levels were better.
“When I eventually came back to boccia, it felt ridiculously easy, like I hadn’t been away. My physical health was better, my mental health was better, and the balls were behaving themselves.
“The nutrition work made me a better athlete but also gave me an escape from the relentless nature of sport and winning. Due to the way boccia is funded, my income was based purely on results and I’d never been results driven. It was becoming more like a job and less like a game – and that was restricting my ability to play well.
“I want to play well, show off, make the crowd excited and rip up the rule book a little bit. The fun had gone out of it.”
Doing doughnuts and dealing with defeat
Smith brought both the fun and the results to Tokyo, winning his second individual Paralympic title with his hair dyed in the colours of the British flag, then celebrating with his trademark wheelchair doughnut.
As well as actively trying to raise the profile of Paralympic sport and helping bring through the next generation of British boccia stars, the 35-year-old athlete also has a more philosophical outlook on competition these days.
“There’s no point worrying about winning and losing, I treat them both the same,” he said.
“You learn more from your defeats, no question … I can’t win every game, I’m human, and boccia is the most competitive Paralympic sport, so the fact that I’ve been so dominant for so long just shows how good I am rather than anything else.
"Even I’m surprised by how long I’ve been able to dominate for . I don’t quite understand it, but I’ll take it.”
Playing to the crowd
With Paris on the horizon, Smith’s ‘body over boccia’ approach remains.
“Lots of my training is around body preparation, maintaining strength and flexibility in key areas to enable my body to do what it needs to do when I’m on court. Much like other athletes at the latter stages of their career, I don’t need to put in the hours that I did when I was in my 20s as I’ve got muscle memory. It’s more about maintaining energy levels then building on key areas [of my game]; quality over quantity.”
Smith aims to stay on the top for as long as possible.
“I’ve got [the] 2032 [Paralympics] in my head because it’s in Brisbane and I’ve never been to Australia and that would be cool. But apart from that I’ve not really put a date on it – I don’t see the point while I’m at the top.
“I’ll carry on playing for as long as I can; not because of the competitiveness, but because I know it helps my body from a cerebral palsy point of view. I’ve got the best physios and medical treatment and that rubs off on my family life in terms of being mobile and flexible.
"Even if I wasn’t playing, I’d be doing a lot of the lifestyle stuff because I know it works. The ball-throwing part of it is almost irrelevant.”
For now, though, it’s very much front and centre, with Smith keen to put on a show as fans return to Paralympic venues to the first time in eight years. He said: “I’ve always liked playing in front of a crowd, I’ve always played better – I don’t know why.
“I loved Tokyo. The venue was spectacular, and it was probably the best moment of my career, having the whole of Boccia UK over my left shoulder while I was playing in the final. I could hear the noise coming from them.
“I hope Paris can make the most of having fans again. In London it was packed, in Rio it was packed and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be packed again. Bring it on.”
Book your tickets for the Paralympic Games by visiting the Paris 2024 ticketing website.
