John McAvoy's mission of redemption: From iron bars to ironman

Unless you are a regular reader of the court reports out of the UK, you may not have heard of John McAvoy. But that is something he intends to change. Photo / Jo Jo Harper

John McAvoy, a former armed robber who spent a decade in prison, is on an unlikely mission of redemption, striving for glory as an Ironman, writes Jim White.

It was when he finished his first Ironman race two years ago that John McAvoy first fully appreciated the value of his unconventional sporting apprenticeship.

He had just completed the mega-triathlon - swimming 3.9km, then cycling 180km before running the full marathon distance of 42km - and he felt fine.

All around him were experienced ironmen collapsing with exhaustion, yet he was bouncing, feeling privileged just to be there.

After all, he thought, how hard is swimming, cycling and running in the fresh air when you have spent your 20s detained at her majesty's pleasure?

It is not a process he recommends, but McAvoy believes that 10 years served behind bars has given him the steely mental resilience to become one of the toughest endurance athletes around.

"I remember a prison officer saying to me after I'd broken the world indoor rowing record when I was still inside, 'You know what John, you've got a gift. You're not only fit, you can suffer. That is a powerful mixture'," he recalls.

Unless you are a regular reader of the court reports out of the UK, you may not have heard of John McAvoy. But that is something he intends to change.

He is on a mission, not only to become the world's best long-distance triathlete but in the process to deliver a message about the power of sport.

"If I'd carried on as I was, I'd be dead," he says. "Or they'd have banged me up and thrown away the key, which is the same thing. Sport saved my life."

As sporting stories go, the one McAvoy, now 33, tells in his newly published auto-
biography is extraordinary. He was born into organised crime. His uncle was a
member of the Brink's-Mat robbery gang, his stepfather is serving a life sentence for armed robbery. At 16 he owned a sawn-off shotgun and was pointing it at security vans across London.

"Thing is," he says, "every ATM takes upwards of £125,000 and they need filling every day."

It was not, though, a career with long-term prospects. By the time he was 18, he had been given a five-year sentence for armed robbery. He served two and came out determined to make an even bigger splash in the underworld.

John McAvoy is on a mission, not only to become the world's best long-distance triathlete but in the process to deliver a message about the power of sport. Photo / Jo Jo Harper

"No one forced me to do anything. I take full responsibility,"

he says. "But I didn't just want to be a criminal, I wanted to be the best there is."

Not long after his release, while living the high life on the 'Costa del Crime', he came back to London for a friend's birthday party and, for want of petty cash, allowed himself to be recruited into a heist.

Unbeknown to him, his partner in crime was being tracked by police, and McAvoy was caught in the act. This time he was sentenced to life for conspiracy to commit armed robbery.

Because of his family background, he was assumed to have contacts who would facilitate escape. So he was sent to Belmarsh high security unit, a prison within a prison. On his first turn round the exercise yard, there were only six other prisoners walking with him.

"Gradually it dawned on me who they were," he recalls. "One was Abu Hamza [who was sentenced to life in prison on terroism charges] and the others were the guys who were in there for trying to blow up the Tube, the 21/7 lot. That's when I properly realised how much trouble I was in."

"But I didn't just want to be a criminal, I wanted to be the best there is." Photo / Jo Jo Harper

As he sank into the mind-numbing tedium of spending 23 hours a day in his cell, McAvoy began a punishing fitness routine.

"Prisoners throw themselves into education, or into drugs, or the gym; it's all to do with escape. I started doing cell circuits: a thousand press-ups, a thousand step-ups, a thousand burpees. Took me two hours a day. I was obsessively doing it. The feel-good hormones made me feel alive."

And when, after two years of good behaviour, he was sent to a conventional prison in York, he hit the gym as often as he could.

"That's when I first realised my capabilities," he says. "I had no interest in sport, never did any as a kid, I didn't know what was good, what was bad.

"They'd have fitness competitions at the prison and no one could get near me. I started to get a reputation as being the fittest prisoner in the system. I liked that."

Still he had no intention of changing. He was biding his time. Keeping his head down until he could get to an open prison, then he was going to abscond, head to Spain, renew his criminal career.

John McAvoy thought, how hard is swimming, cycling and running in the fresh air when you have spent your 20s detained at her majesty's pleasure? Photo / Jo Jo Harper

But things changed some five years into his sentence, when he saw on the television news that his best friend had been killed in a car crash in a getaway from a hold-up.

"They had CCTV footage of him committing the robbery. He had a scarf over his face, but I could tell it was him because of his eyes. I'm watching the last moments of my best mate's life.

"And something clicked in my head. I thought, I can't do this any more. What have I done with my life? From 17 to 27, I've sat in prison. I've got nothing to show for myself."

It was then that he discovered the indoor rowing machine. And when an officer noticed how good he was, he started to accumulate records.

He broke the British record for rowing the marathon, then smashed the world record for distance rowed in 24 hours. By the time he went to open prison, instead of trying to escape, all he wanted to do was see if he could match his indoor scores on the water.

Which was how, the day after he was released, he found himself at London Rowing Club in Putney. What a contrast the oak-panelled privilege of the place was to where he had spent the previous eight years.

"I had the preconception this would be elitist, they'd look down on me. What happened when I first came, they embraced me," he says.