Amy Williams' blog by Amy_Williams

The summer has come, been and now officially gone and I feel like my brain and body is still back in June! Time has flown by! Usually, I am attending multiple weddings throughout the summer but this year I just had one - my two friends Mike Tindall and the stunning Zara Philips. It was a beautiful wedding, a magical day, full of their close friends and family. After the usual slight stress of finding a dress, a bag, a hat, booking into a hotel and getting the flight up to Edinburgh, I had a weekend I will never forget! The amount of love that was shown by Mike and Zara for each other and by all their friends was amazing to witness. I am not going to divulge details of the day, but it was a beautiful wedding and I wish them both the very best of luck for all their years to come.

This summer has seen me focus on getting back in shape for the up-and-coming season. Training has been going very well recently. My knee is recovering nicely after the operation and I’m slowly getting my leg back into shape. I do worry and think that knees may not ever work to the same capacity that they did before an operation, but thus far my ‘bad’ leg is catching up with my ‘good’ leg! I have started counting down the weeks until I will pack my bags and head to the ice. It’s only 6 weeks away, meaning I have 6 weeks to get into great shape and I’m determined to do it!

Away from the track and besides the wedding, I have had an on-going matter that has interested me. A few weeks ago I was approached by a local Bath sculptor, Alan Dun, who asked me if I minded that he created a sculpture of me. Well, no one had ever asked me before and I was intrigued, so asked him more about it. He is one of the chosen sculptors doing a local project called Art at the Edge. This will be a commissioned collection of 30 bronze sculptural studies of different Olympic and Paralympic sports and will be shown in Bath in the summer of 2012 at the Victoria Art Gallery, to coincide with the arrival of the Olympic torch. I was excited by this and after going to his workshop to see some of his work, I agreed. The sculpture that will be created will be me on my sled coming around a corner of the track. I am keeping tabs on how it’s progressing so I will keep you up to date.

Another point of interest to keep an eye out for is starting shortly. I want everyone to tune in to ITV at 9pm on 13th September (tomorrow) to watch me on the new series of 71 Degrees North. I was in Norway taking part in the show earlier this year and it seems so long ago now, that even I am going to watch to remind myself what happened! I have had to keep very quiet about it thus far but now I’m really excited about being able to sit down with my friends and finally show them all the crazy challenges that I got up to in the Arctic. I had a fantastic time, it was very challenging and seriously some of the hardest activities I have ever put my body through. I won’t say any more – you will just have to watch for yourselves to find out! I am sure it will be great viewing so get series link programmed in!