Exclusive by Owen Morgan

Years of endurance training have set up Eli Kirk for her next challenge, combining a new career as a junior doctor with qualification for her third Commonwealth Games.

The Welsh international distance runner has left the New Balance Manchester professional running team to make use of her medical degree.

Despite the notoriously long hours put in by junior doctors, Kirk still hopes to clock up the miles as an international athlete and book her place at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games in 2022.

The greatest threat to Kirk achieving her goal currently is an Achilles problem, but ironically that injury and the lack of races during lockdown has helped her make the hectic transition from professional athlete to full-time medic.

The 31-year-old told Dai Sport, she has been suffering from the injury since February, just before lockdown began.

“There is never a good time to be injured,” said the Swansea Harrier, “but because there were no races, I wasn’t in a rush to get back running, so if there was a good time for it to happen it was then.

“Had it been a normal season I would have probably tried to get back into training sooner than I did and risked getting injured again, so if anything it made me a bit more cautious.

“Normally I would have been itching to get back running and get back on my feet again. But there was nothing to get back for, so I thought I might as well get my Achilles properly right before getting back.

“It’s a chronic Achilles problem so it’s still not great, I’m running a bit but definitely not as much as I would like to be, it’s still nagging and it’s still there.

“I’m actually back in medicine now, I’ve started full-time work at the end of July so it’s good timing because I haven’t got much time to run at the moment anyway, while I get into medicine and get into the swing of that.

“I would love to be running every day, but at the same time I come back from work and I’m really tired so to not have to go for a run is quite nice!”

Since completing her medicine degree, Kirk has lived the life of a professional athlete as part of the New Balance sponsored team in Manchester, living and training with the other athletes under the watchful eye of renowned coach Steve Vernon.

A promising athlete from a young age, Kirk came to wider prominence in 2014 while studying at the University of Alabama in the United States.

Running in the highly prestigious and competitive NCAA Division One Championships, the former Ysgol Gyfun Gwyr student won silver in the 10,000m, having already won bronze over 3,000m at the indoor championships.

Later the same year, Kirk represented Wales at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow over both 5,000m and 10,000 over the space of a few days, finishing 12th and 9th respectively.

In 2017 the Swansea athlete ran her first marathon, clocking an excellent 2:36.21 in Italy before going on to represent Wales in sweltering conditions at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games marathon the following year.

Last December Kirk ran 2:34.38 at the Valencia Marathon – the fifth fastest marathon ever by a Welsh woman – a time which put her within striking distance of the Olympic qualifying standard.

But Kirk had made the decision to return to medicine. “I had to decide fairly early on when I was going to go back to medicine because there was an exam I had to do before applying due to having had a gap between graduating and going into medicine.

“I still want to run as much as I can, I’ve still got Birmingham Commonwealth Games at the back of my mind but I felt it was the right time to go back into medicine.

“I didn’t want to leave it to the very end of my running career and then start it. I wanted to phase it in gradually.

“The Olympics were definitely on my radar but I was quite realistic, I knew I would have to step up to get to the Olympics. I knew it was within reach but it may have taken another couple of years.”

Now she acclimatising to the culture shock of swapping her professional athlete’s spikes for a stethoscope.

Kirk says: “I’m on a respiratory ward in a hospital just outside Manchester. I’m on the wards and it’s keeping me busy . . . I’m doing plenty of exercise walking around all day!”

Fortunately the coronavirus pandemic hasn’t impacted on her first few weeks at the hospital.

“Luckily there are no cases in the area at the moment,” says Kirk. “At least not in this hospital, so I’m not directly in the coronavirus ward. I’m not seeing patients with it day to day.

“It’s busy enough though. I’ve worked part-time over the past few years while I’ve been running, but I haven’t had a full time job so it’s definitely a shock to the system!

“I’ll miss the team. It was a massive part of my life. I’m still living up in Manchester so I will see them all the time and on days when I am not working I will probably go and join them for runs. It will be nice to still be part of it, I’ll be able to join them when I can.

“It’s definitely a change to go from living an athlete’s lifestyle to a job where running and medicine don’t really go hand in hand. But if I want to fit running in, then I can.”

It’s certainly going to be a challenge with Kirk having to work some weekends and at least one shift a week lasting 13 hours.

“With time it will probably get easier but when you have your first job as a doctor, when you’re a junior doctor, it’s notoriously known to be a hard two years because you are on the ward day to day, sorting things out, making sure everything’s running smoothly, so you’re just really busy.

“For two years you have a really busy job but the higher you get in medicine the easier it becomes so in a year or two years I will have a lot less on my plate so it will be easier to manage my time and it becomes a lot more flexible.

“So I think I just need to suck it up for a year and then it will hopefully get a lot easier.

“I definitely think the marathon training has prepared me well for the long hours, once a week we have to do a long day from 8am until 9pm.

“I could get up really early and go for a run, but actually I’d just exhaust myself so at the moment I’m just trying to be sensible and not burn the candle at both ends.

“I love running and I would do anything to be running fully now but it’s quite nice to have the flexibility of knowing that I haven’t got any set training at the moment, I don’t have to be stressed about that.

“Not that running is stressful, but sometimes if I was working until 5pm and then I couldn’t leave until six and I was stressed because I had a training session that evening on the track, I haven’t got that at the moment so it nice not to let running be a stress.”

Despite her drastic career change, Kirk still has ambitions to make it to a third Commonwealth Games at Birmingham in two years’ time.

Much now depends on whether Kirk can shake off the stubborn Achilles problem which had plagued her for a number of years before deteriorating in February.

“I just need to find the rehab that works for it. I’ve tried loads of different rehabs . I had a really bad Achilles about two years ago and I managed to get it right again so I have got a faith that I can get it right again . . . hopefully.

“I can get that back properly healthy and pain free I would love to have a proper track season next year, possibly do another marathon,” she says.

“I would love to be able to get up in the morning and go for a run but I think I would snap my Achilles, I can barely walk in the morning let alone run. I would love to get back to a high level, but at the moment it’s all a bit up in the air.

“Normally I try to hit between 90 and 100 miles a week for marathon training and that’s probably what I’ve done for my other marathon build ups, averaging about 90 to 100 miles for eight weeks.

“I don’t know what time I’ll be getting up in the morning! But at the moment I’m just doing a lot of cycling. I really like the bike and cross training so it’s not chore for me at all.

“My dad’s a keen cyclist so he’s always cycled and when I was younger I used to go out around the Gower with him so he got me into it, it’s always been something I’ve gone to when I’ve been injured.

“I think I will keep it in my training more regularly now because it’s so nice to get out on the bike. You can go out for hours and you get tired but it’s just different to running.

Kirk admits making the Commonwealth won’t be easy between juggling her new career with earning a place on what will be a hugely competitive Welsh team.

But the fluent Welsh speaker has never been one to shirk a challenge.”It would be amazing to go to a third Commonwealth Games, that would be really special.

“I haven’t completely set my sights on it yet, but it’s definitely at the back of my mind if I can manage it with the medicine and everything.

“Quite a few of my family members came out to the Gold Coast which was really nice, although I had a terrible race my family being there really made up for it and I was happy to be there.

“Birmingham would feel like a home games. It would be a really cool event to try and aim for.

“Distance running in Wales is doing so well at the moment so it’s nice that we have got a group of girls that are so competitive and we can push each other on.

“In years gone by, if you’d got the qualifying time then you’d have been on the team but I don’t think that will be the case anymore which is cool.

“It raises the bar and you think ‘hang on I can’t stay comfortable here, I need to think about how I can improve, you want to develop yourself as an athlete as well.

“I love a challenge I’m not scared by hard work, so getting up early, trying to fit things in, that doesn’t daunt me.

“But at the same time I want to be sensible and don’t want to completely kill myself by burning the candle at both ends.

“I think I will take the sensible approach, but also not be afraid of doing the hard work and putting the hours in.”