400m gold medallist Chrstine Ohuruogu attended the UEL active campus celebration yesterday to talk about her childhood, career and why physical activity is so important for young people.

Early Passions

Ohuruogu, was born in Newham and still lives here today, delivered a 30-minute talk followed by a Q and A at the end. She spoke about her original passion being netball, which she represented England at u17 and u19 level, and how she came to running quite late and only started to train properly for the 400m seriously when she was 18.

Stratford Silver

She spoke about the incredible feeling of winning a silver medal at London 2012, in a stadium only a walking distance from where she grew up. She also touched on the lows of being an athlete, including not being able to run after a serious injury and having to train in a swimming pool.

Get UEL Fit

After the talk and Q and A, she led a 400m walk around the UEL campus. This gave the attendees of the talk the chance to see the different activities, which included a pop-up skate park and pop-up roller skating rink. The active campus celebration is part of the university’s mission to promote physical activity and mental wellbeing among students, staff and the local community. A heated pop up swimming pool was opened on the 23rd of October and there are plans for a pop up skatepark to be opened in the spring, with the park being designed and decorated by students.