Ennis has recently changed her hurdling technique so she attacks the first barrier more. She once considered doubling up in the individual event at London 2012 but the schedule worked against her. Ennis is already ranked No 2 at the event in Britain — behind Tiffany Porter.
In Birmingham two months ago, she set a personal best of 7.87sec over the 60m hurdles to beat hurdles specialist Danielle Carruthers. Carruthers, of the USA, won silver at last summer’s World Championships.
Ennis said: “It was exciting knowing I can be competitive with some top hurdlers.”
Sheffield-born Ennis was forced to settle for World Indoor silver last month in Istanbul. That came seven months after getting the same colour gong at the World Championships. She had gone into both events as defending champion but lost to reigning Olympic champ Nataliya Dobrynska from the Ukraine over five events indoors in Turkey.
Russian Tatyana Chernova beat her in the heptathlon last August and the trio will meet once before London at the world-class multi-event championships in Gotzis, Austria next month. That is the exact place where Ennis’ hopes of competing in Beijing four years ago were wrecked with an ankle stress fracture. It is easy to forget that London 2012 will be her Olympic debut.
Ennis, who switches off at home by planning next year’s wedding to fiance Andy Hill, also admits: “You can’t afford to have one below-par event.
“That’s what it takes to win a gold medal.
“Have I dared to dream? I can honestly say I haven’t. I have lots of dreams about my wedding but not the Olympics.
“When something like that creeps into my thoughts I put them out of my mind straight away because there is so much to be done before that.
“So much that can go right, so much that can go wrong. I just don’t think it’s healthy to really fixate on winning that medal. I just focus on the here and now.
“Competing in London does bring more pressure but as an athlete, an Olympic Games is the ultimate competition.
“There are many more eyes on you with it being at home but it is a great position to be in. I try to use pressure in a positive way.”
Jessica Ennis recently helped launch the new Powerade Olympic Games Sports Bottle, which will be used to hydrate athletes at the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The bottle is available for free with any promotional bottle of Powerade. For more information visit www.poweradesportsbottle.com.
