I grew up watching the Olympics and did some athletics for my school, winning the Welsh pentathlon championship.
Only recently have I been introduced to the gym and heavy weightlifting and things like that. Before that, when I grew up, I just did a lot of gymnastics and dance. I had more of an athletic background, but nothing where I was in the gym or using any kind of weights.
My eldest sister Beth is a doctor who studied at Harvard and Columbia and played basketball for Harvard. She set the athletic and academic standard for the rest of us to follow.
When I found skating, it was something that was individual, and it was something that I could focus on being my best. And I loved the whole practice, and I also loved performing. It was probably the first time I felt really good about myself and that I was good at something, because I always liked being athletic.
I'm naturally athletic, and I think playing strong, female roles just kind of happened.
The Olympic Games are highly commercialised. They purport to follow the traditions of an ancient athletics competition, but today it is the commercial aspect that is most apparent. I have seen how, through sport, cities and corporations compete against each other for financial gain.
In athletics, the idea of possibility is presumed. It's not 'if;' it's 'how.'
In general I like a guy who is athletic, somebody who can teach me something. Whether it's teaching me a new way to cut on a wave or teach me a three-point conversion or teach me how to dribble a soccer ball. There's something really cool about that.
I'm an athletic actor. I'm known for my action; I'm a guy who does my own stunts on screen.
I was an average student, who took active interest in athletics.
