interview

BEING THE NUTS

We talk to Mike Muckelt about his talent in javelin and what it’s like to be ‘the nuts’.

Our local star from Petersfield is 18 years old and is currently studying sport, human biology and sociology at Southdowns College, Crookhorn. 

Although Mike has participated in many sports at a good level, this did not affect his studies and he left school with 13 GCSEs (7 As and 6 Bs).  Mike enjoyed throwing the javelin during pe lessons at The Petersfield School.  He went on to take part in a trial for Portsmouth Athletics Club and was successful in being selected to join the club.  After a couple of years Mike has gone from strength to strength and describes his performance as “being the nuts”.

He is a dedicated athlete and trains everyday and up to 18 hours a week doing gymnastics, weights and stretching.  This training has paid off and in 2012 Mike was ranked 2^nd in the under 18s and is currently ranked 10^th in the under 20s age group in the UK.

This very talented athlete competes for not one team but three; Portsmouth, Southampton and Hampshire. Unlike other sports such as football and rugby, there is no rivalry between clubs as it is an individual sport.  Mike will be competing from now until August for all these teams every weekend. 

When asked if he would carry on with sport in the future his answer was “sport is my life, so yes”.

I also asked him what job he would like to be doing after studying and he responded with “I’d like to coach javelin but I won’t stop competing until my late 30s because we peak late 20s to early 30s”.

We wish him all the luck in the future.