Ali Jawad: On Russia’s Tokyo 2020 Ban And His Battle Against Crohn’s disease To Break World Records

Andrea Macdonald, founder of ideaXme, interviews Ali Jawad, Paralympic gold medalist and world record breaking powerlifter.

“When I was born the doctor wanted to kill me!”, Ali Jawad.

Jawad, is a Paralympic gold medalist and world record breaking powerlifter with Crohn’s disease who was influenced by American sprinter Michael Johnson whom he saw on the medal winners podium as a child and whose success he wanted to emanate in a Paralympian sport.

Ali has had to overcome many challenges in life. His motto: “Why be the best when you can be the greatest?”. Ali’s competition personal best is 195kg but in the gym he has bench pressed over 200kg.

Ali Jawad’s journey to the top of Paralympian powerlifting

Jawad, born as a double above the knee amputee, is a full time athlete, currently competing at 54kg in the qualifying rounds (final round end of April 2020) to participate in the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics. Although, Ali is one of the highest performing powerlifters in the world he can be taken down by Crohn’s disease at any time. Ali took up powerlifting at the age of 16. He competed in the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, finishing fourth. The following year he took gold at the Asian Open Championships making a world record lift of 185.5 kg.

He gained a world title at the 2014 World Championships in Dubai, won the European title and gold at the 2015 Americas Open Championships and at the 2016 Rio Games, Ali won silver and his first ever Paralympic medal for lifting 190kg. More recently he claimed silver at the Tokyo 2019 World Para Powerlifting World Cup at the Tokyo 2020 test event.

Celebratory dances by Ali Jawad that “go viral” on social media

He is famous across social media for his celebratory competition dances, some of which have “gone viral”. Revealed in this interview, a new dance is planned for Tokyo 2020. “I’ll try my best to think of another one for Tokyo 2020” Ali Jawad.

What is Crohn Disease?

Crohn’s disease is an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). It causes inflammation of your digestive tract, which can lead to abdominal pain, severe diarrhea, fatigue, weight loss and malnutrition. Inflammation caused by Crohn’s disease can involve different areas of the digestive tract in different people. Source Mayo Clinic

Living with Crohn’s disease and the challenges to control pain

Despite the pressure of living with Crohn’s disease, performing as an elite athlete with high levels of pain and challenges to control that discomfort, Ali is an anti- doping advocate and educator sitting on the UK Athletes Anti Doping Commission Board. He is one of the highest profile commentators in the athlete movement to ban doping. This interview includes Ali’s comments relating to the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) ruling on 9 December 2019 which bans Russia from competing at Tokyo 2020. ideaXme was the first organisation to catch Ali for his reaction to ruling.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA)

On 9 December, the World Anti-Doping Agency’s Executive Committee (ExCo) endorsed the recommendation made by the independent Compliance Review Committee (CRC) that the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) be declared non-compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code (Code) for a period of four years. Meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, the 12-member ExCo supported the CRC’s recommendation, which includes a series of strong consequences and conditions of reinstatement in accordance with the International Standard for Code Compliance by Signatories (ISCCS).

The Chair of the CRC, Jonathan Taylor QC, took ExCo members through the CRC’s recommendation, which had been provided to ExCo members on 25 November together with the report of WADA Intelligence and Investigations (I&I) and that of the independent forensic experts from Lausanne University’s Institute of Forensic Science. “For too long, Russian doping has detracted from clean sport. The blatant breach by the Russian authorities of RUSADA’s reinstatement conditions, approved by the ExCo in September 2018, demanded a robust response. That is exactly what has been delivered today.

Russia was afforded every opportunity to get its house in order and re-join the global anti-doping community for the good of its athletes and for the integrity of sport, but it chose instead to continue in its stance of deception and denial. As a result, the WADA ExCo has responded in the strongest possible terms, while protecting the rights of Russian athletes that can prove that they were not involved and did not benefit from these fraudulent acts”. WADA

Since the interview, WADA received the resignation of Victoria Aggar, a highly respected member of its own Athlete Committee, who said she was standing down after WADA broke its promises and failed to protect clean athletes.

Paralympics now matches the Olympics in popularity

Demand for The Paralympics 2020: When it comes to tickets, next year’s Tokyo Paralympics will be just like the Olympics. International Paralympic President Andrew Parsons announced on Tuesday this week that there were 3.1 million tickets requested earlier this year in the first lottery phase. This exceeds the 2.3 million available. About 600,000 tickets were awarded in the first lottery, and another lottery is set for early next year.

Tokyo 2020 a new ideaXme playlist on YouTube

Follow ideaXme’s Tokyo 2020 playlist in the lead up to both the Olympics and Paralympics 2020. This interview is the first of many interviews with the top athletes who are set to take part.

Credits: Filming by Alan Johnson and Parth Kakkar Metfilm. From 16 December 2019, interview transcript: www.radioideaxme.com.

Dedication to Michael Seres a fellow suffer of Crohn’s disease

This interview is dedicated to Michael Seres, founder of 11Health and ideaXme health ambassador who was supposed to interview Ali but is undergoing STEM cell treatment and chemotherapy for Crohn’s disease. Get well soon Michael!

Ali’s Diagnosis of Crohn’s disease

In 2009, the night before he was set to compete in Beijing, Ali became ill which later led to a diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. The disease threatened to retire him from the sport and left him with two very difficult treatment options to choose from.

Ali made a choice that was risky, but allowed him to compete in the sport that he has loved his entire life. He gained a world title at the 2014 World Championships in Dubai, won the European title and gold at the 2015 Americas Open Championships and at the 2016 Rio Games, Ali won silver and his first ever Paralympic medal for lifting 190kg.

Below, the full text Ali Jawad’s interview with ideaXme

Andrea Macdonald, founder of ideaXme Who are you?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:00:12] My name is Ali Jawad and I’m a Paralympic powerlifter for the UK.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:00:16] Tell me a little bit about how you grew up.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:00:21] My upbringing was quite a good upbringing. I was born in Lebanon, and at the time Lebanon was going through a serious civil war against Israel. It was very war-torn with lots of impoverished areas with no food or money. When my mom got pregnant, it was quite hard for them because they didn’t know how the state of the country was going to affect me growing up. Though, looking at the pregnancy scans at the time, the doctors told my parents that I was a normal and healthy boy.

[00:01:03] When my mum gave birth, unfortunately, I came out with no legs which was a huge shock because nobody actually anticipated the results of the scans, so somebody must’ve overlooked it. When it happened, the doctor took my dad aside and asked him whether he wanted to get rid of me which was code for, “we’ll kill him off.” At the time, disabled people were hidden from society in the Lebanon. Families would struggle having an able-bodied child, let alone a disabled child. So my parents decided that it was time to move countries for me to have a better life. Luckily, I came to the UK when I was six months old.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:01:59] This very difficult beginning in life led to a career of being a world record breaker and a gold medalist. Can you tell us a little of the your career highlights?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:02:23] What I remember most, and this probably sounds a little bit crazy but it was growing up wanting to get to the Paralympic games, that was my dream since I was about six. I watched Michael Johnson at the ‘96 Atlanta Olympics and he won that incredible historic double. Even though he was American and he had legs, I wanted to be like him. At the top of the podium he was crying his eyes out and I was like, I want that feeling and I had to find a sport that I was good at. I guess for me, it took until I was about 19 and managed to qualify for the Beijing Olympic Games on my birthday, which is probably the best present I could’ve given myself. Even though I’ve gone on to win major medals since, I was proudest at that moment, because it was new, it was raw and it was a dream come true for me. That was probably the biggest highlight to date in terms of feelings.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:03:36] Tell us about the biggest weight that you’ve lifted and the circumstances around that.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:03:43] My personal best (competition PB) is 195 kilos but in the gym, I’ve bench pressed over 200. Growing up in the sport, 200 kilos is a weight that, if you got it in a competition, you’re kind of up there with the legends. It’s very very rare that someone lifts 200 kilos in the lighter weight classes. There’s only been, maybe four or five people that have ever done it. I got extremely close five years ago and I don’t think I’m going to get back to that sort of level because of my health, but I was very lucky to be able to lift that in the gym, so for me, I have done it, just not officially.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:04:29] You have Tokyo 2020 coming up. I was really interested to find out that the qualifying events lead as late as April 2020. So this is a very high-stress situation to be so close to the Paralympic Games and not to know whether you are fully qualified. Can you talk about the qualifying events?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:05:05] Yeah. You’ve got a two-year window before the games to get into the top eight in the world in your bodyweight class and the deadline is April 2020. So it’s the eight biggest lifts in the world during that two year period.

[00:05:25] What makes it a little bit more difficult is that you just don’t know what weight you need. You literally have to do the competitions to get a gauge of where eight place is. It’s really important that at every opportunity where you qualify, to either maintain your ranking or improve your ranking. We’re not going to know until after that deadline so it is kind of stressful, but at the same time, it encourages you to lift as much as you can in that qualification window, so you have some kind of reassurance leading up to the games. I probably won’t find out until May, which is very late.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:06:16] One of your main competitors is an Egyptian who you happen to like very much.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:06:20] Yeah. Sherif Osman is arguably the greatest of all time. I call him the Usain Bolt of our sport. He’s also a very nice guy, which is difficult. I get along with him very well, to be honest. As a kid growing up, I saw him compete in Beijing and he was one of the first man to ever bench press 200 kilos in the lightweight classes. It blew my mind back then and I never thought that I was going to take him on in my life and in my career. Next year I will not be competing against him as I’m actually in a different bodyweight class because of my health. He’s gone up a bodyweight and I’ve gone down. He’s always been at 59. He did one competition at 54, five years ago and now he’s back at 59. For me, my main competition is Nigeria (Paul Kehinde).

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:07:21] So there was a big announcement today. Can we talk about it?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:07:30] Sure. The Russian doping scandal has been very well documented over the last four years. I’ve been a massive advocate of clean sport and I’ve tried my best to put pressure on the authorities and make them accountable for every decision they make on behalf of athletes. I feel like the authorities have been very soft in recent times on Russia and today they’ve imposed sanctions against Russia – a four-year ban. They’ll be no Russian national anthem or national flag at the Olympics next year and even though it has been the harshest sanctions so far against Russia, for me it doesn’t go far enough because there’s no blanket ban. If Russia can prove that they’re clean from testing outside of Russia, they might be able to complete at the games under a neutral flag.

[00:08:38] My concern is that, one, it shouldn’t have gone this far. Two, WADA begged for new powers four years ago, new powers to enforce sanctions because before they didn’t have these powers. Now that they finally have these powers, they haven’t used them fully.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:09:03] Can you talk about your official roles within this context.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:09:07] Yes. So, I’m part of the UK Anti Doping Athlete Commission and I’m one of the start up members of Global Athlete I’m on the Paralympics GB Commission. So I represent athlete’s views on a variety of organisations.

00:09:27] It’s all about fairness. Is it fair that we’re asking athletes to not only hold their integrity at all times but to be bound under the strictest rules? As athletes, we have to live our lives really strictly to conform to anti-doping rules. But when WADA itself is soft on a state doping program, how does that make us feel? I don’t think we quite realise that from the outside. It looks like the number one stakeholders in sports, which are the athletes, are not really being considered in any decision making that’s being taken. I think athletes are losing confidence in the system slowly and WADA have got a lot of making up to do within the next five to ten years.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:10:20] It’s presumably a huge amount of work to get into the Olympics and Paralympics and then somebody is cutting corners. It must be enraging.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:10:32] It’s not even cutting corners, it’s cutting corners to the extent of what happened in Russia. With athletes, you know there may be someone who’s going to cheat. However, when you’ve got a State  forcing athletes to take this route to get to the games, you have to protect the athletes. The only way to protect these athletes is by having the harshest sanctions possible, not only to ban the State but to ban the athletes. A lot of people say to me, but what about the clean Russian athletes? For me, this is a welfare issue so the next generation of athletes are going to look at this and think actually, doping is ok because there’s no harsh punishment. The only way to protect the next generation is a culture change and there has to be a meaningful change that punishes the guilty country for a long time, so they can think about what they’ve done. I think that they should have gone further today.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:11:39] Can we talk about Crohn’s disease and how you’ve managed that within this context. You’re one of the biggest “athlete voices” as far as anti-doping is concerned. Yet, to manage your condition you have to take a number of drugs and be very careful about what you take. One example is marijuana, which continues to be banned by all the sporting bodies, yet the world’s view of marijuana legally and socially is changing. It’s now legal in this country to take a marijuana-based drug. As long as it is for pain relief, it can be taken as a muscle relaxant. Could you talk a little bit about that? Because that must be really difficult to manage given with a Crohn’s disease flare up comes unbearable pain. How do you cope with and navigate all of that?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:13:09] Let me explain the context. I got diagnosed with Crohn’s in 2009, I got sick the night before I competed in Beijing and it took about nine months to diagnose me. I’ve had periods of flares and I’ve only been in remission for three out of the ten years that I’ve had it. After I won my Silver in Rio, I had a massive flare, probably the biggest of my life at the end of 2016. I tried different medications on the market, new ones, and they weren’t working for me.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:13:52 ] Prednisone. Have you used that?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:13:54] Yes, that’s what I’m on now but you can only use that short term as it’s so toxic, with a catabolic effect. It’s a very dangerous drug to use long term. So you’re given a massive hit of it and then doctors try to take you off of the drug.

[00:14:12] Last year, when we’d tried everything, I received the news that nothing was working me and I was given two options. One was a stoma bag and the other was a potential stem cell trial lasting over a year, but I needed aggressive chemotherapy in as part of that process. With both options, doctors didn’t see a way for me to compete again.  I was told it had to be retirement. I went away and thought, ok, this is bad news, however, I’m not ready to retire yet, I really want to go for Gold in Tokyo. I went away and thought about it and thought that there’s one more option that could potentially be something that the doctors give me and it was arguable a more high risk option but I knew the effects and consequences of that option.

[00:15:18] I had spoken to my team about it and felt like I had the team and the resources to actually attempt it. I didn’t know if I was going to win a medal next year or even get to attempt it, but all I wanted was a shot. I felt that this route might give me that shot and decided with all the information in front of me that I will delay the stem cell trial and go for the medication option which his prednisone. Pred over 2 years and in the doses is that I need to survive is highly risky.

Not only the toxic effects it has on the body in general but the training effects that it has on the body too. So being catabolic, there’s a lack of recovery, fatigue, pain, lack of sleep. You can also rip muscles, which I’ve done over the last couple of years. I knew that it was the only option that was going to at least get me to the start line or onto the platform. The weird thing was, at that time when people discovered the route that I was going to take, they asked, what about marijuana, the results have been so good for people, you need to think about it. But my mindset was, at the moment I’m an athlete and I’m bound by the WADA code. So even though the results have been promising, that option is impossible for me and there is no way I will get a therapeutic exemption for using it when there are other options available to me.

[00:17:36] Now, when I retire fully from sport, that could be an option that I think about but I have never taken a recreational drug in my life. I’ve grown up being very anti-drugs no matter what. It would be going against my values and morals if I went down that route anyway. I don’t even like taking medication for my Crohn’s. I don’t even take supplements for my sport, I’m against supplements and go for the natural food route. I do everything I can naturally, to the best of my ability, and that my health allows me to.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:18:25] I should at this point, give a shout out to Michael Sears, the founder of 11Health who is currently going through the stem cell therapy and chemotherapy and is having an extremely tough time. He was supposed to be conducting this interview as he’s the ideaXme health ambassador. So shout out to Michael and hope he’s getting better.

[00:18:52] You’ve had a really tough time. It’s hellish tough to be a Paralympian as it is and to compete against the world’s best. I’m just interested to hear along your human journey, who have been the people that have boosted you psychologically, physically and all round to move you forward. What were the rich connections that you formed?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:19:36] I’m lucky enough to have had inspirational people at different stages of my career. When I first started powerlifting when I was younger, I was at school in my GCSE year. It was Dave Kaye and Lee Moore that harnessed my talent and developed me as a junior athlete. They got me to a Paralympic game in 18 months from nothing, which is unheard of in my sport. It was actually Dave Kaye and Lee that opened my mind to the issue of doping.

[00:20:20] I remember my first week in the gym when I first started and was 15 at the time. At my first training session, Dave called me into his office, he was a very old man, very regimental, quite scary and I thought that I’d done something wrong. He said, listen to me, in ten years time, you’re going to be at the Paralympic games, on the podium and you’re going to be either second or third. I was like oh great, cheers, thanks. He said you’ll know that the people in front of you are doing something that they’re not supposed to do and you have two choices. One, you do what they’re doing and be the best in the world. Or two, you can sleep well at night not only knowing you’re the cleanest athlete but you’re the best cleanest athlete in the world and you’ve scared these druggies by nearly outsmarting them. I said, what are you trying to say. He told me that in my sport, doping is the worst and the authorities aren’t doing enough. He said your second option is to dope, but if you’re going to take that option you need to get out of my gym because I only train clean athletes.

[00:21:29] I was 15 and gobsmacked. He’s telling me that to win my sport I might have to do things that I don’t want to do. I went outside, got some fresh air and thought, is this really worth it? Can I find another sport where I don’t have to do this? Then he gave me an idea and said, imagine if we can outsmart these people naturally, through diet, through lifestyle, through good coaching and hardwork. I’ve got the Rocky films and he had that Rocky Balboa mentality and obviously Rocky fought Ivan Drago and I thought, this is great! He also made me realise that the doping system at the time was just not good and something had to be done. That’s when my fascination with anti-doping first happened. I’ve wanted to fight for a clean sport since then. So, those men laid down the foundations for my career.

[00:22:32] Then you had Colin Sampson at the University of East London (UEL) as well as David Cosford, Matt Townsley and Duncan (surname not provided).

After Beijing when I got diagnosed with Crohn’s, I took myself off the program because nobody thought that I was going to come back, they thought I had to retire. At UEL they believed that it could still be done, just because you’ve got Crohn’s and nobody else has done it, it doesn’t mean you can’t was their mentality. They gave me all the resources possible to try and launch a comeback. I was lucky enough that I didn’t have to attend the weight class performance program and having that support laid down the foundations for that comeback when nobody expected it.

[00:23:27] Since 2011, there’s been one man at my side all of the time and that’s Tom Whittaker. I never tell him how much I value him face to face but he’s been the person that has saved my career. With him, I’ve achieved all of my major medals. He’s someone that’s kind of my boss, someone that’s inspiring, someone that pushes me everyday, someone that makes me think differently and he’s taught me a lot. We’ve been on this rollercoaster journey together and if it wasn’t for him, I don’t think that I’d be getting the support that I do from a team that he’s led. Anybody else would look at the situation and think actually, you’ve got no chance here, you need to think about your health. I’m lucky that he knows me and with what we’ve gone through together, he believes in my ability. If he can give me the best resources possible, with the team that I have who have faith that I can do it, then I can do it. I want to do it for them as much as for me. They’ve had to sacrifice as much as me to pull this off, so I want to do it for them too.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:24:55] You’re a celebrity sportsman.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:24:58] I don’t know about that.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:25:00] You’re on so many committees representing other athletes as an athlete’s voice for athletes. You know a lot of people within the broad entertainment world and you’ve done your own spot of entertainment, the celebration dance that you do when you win. So you meet lots of incredible people, out of everybody that you could meet, past, present, imagined, who would you most like to meet and what question would you like to ask that person?

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:25:50] Obviously, Michael Johnson is someone that initially inspired me to get into sport after watching him. I have met him but he doesn’t remember. However, I’d like to sit down and pick his brain about a champion’s mentality. He dominated his sport and I feel like he must’ve been under a lot of pressure going to Atlanta, especially with the Golden Spikes he had to wear. I want to sit down with him because when you’ve got someone who’s inspired you since you were a kid you want to say, tell me your secrets. How do you get through bad times? How do you ensure that your training environment and your life is optimal to your performance? Also, what motivated him to keep getting better, as after ‘96, you can’t really get much better than that. But he managed to get better until 2000, so for me, it’s all about having that self improvement at all times and at all costs.

[00:27:03] Also, I grew up with Rocky films and feel like the Rocky Balboa character not only represents me and what I’ve been through but he represents people in life. People that do struggle. It’s the fact that you may not get to where you want to be but you don’t give up. That’s what I took from Rocky. It’s not about the outcome, it’s about the process and how you conducted yourself. I was lucky enough last year to meet Sylvester Stallone. That was at the time I had to decide whether to retire and take the treatment or to give it one final push. When I met him I realised I’ve got to do this. Not just for myself but for the people who have been loyal to me and the Crohn’s and Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) sufferers out there that have a dream and think that their condition is going to stop them. If I can prove to them that it won’t stop them, it might just inspire many people with my condition not to take the risk that I did, as it is risky, but to fight and live a life that they want to on their terms and not on the terms of the disease.

[00:28:23] Next year, winning a medal or the gold medal although it’s the outcome that I want and why I came back, for me, it’s bigger than that. It’s making sure that more research goes into Crohn’s. It shows Crohn’s sufferers that you can push the disease to its very limits, survive and come back.

Andrea Macdonald, founder ideaXme [00:28:53] Ali Jawad, all the best of luck with Tokyo 2020 and don’t forget to do your special dance.

Ali Jawad, Paralympic powerlifter [00:29:01] I’ll try my best to think of another one, thanks.

Credits: Andrea Macdonald interview text, video, and audio.

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