Beth Mead has had a busy couple of weeks. Last Tuesday (5 December) she was in Scotland with the Lionesses, ending her first England camp in over a year with an action-packed 6-0 victory (which still wasn’t enough to see the team through to the next round of the Paris Olympic qualifiers). When we speak, she’s just got back from the first of two training sessions for Arsenal’s top-of-the-table clash against Chelsea at the weekend – a match that will see the club claim an emphatic 4-1 win. And on top of all that, there’s one more important responsibility to shoulder: her new puppy, Myle.

“At the moment my sleep is far from perfect because she likes to cry and go to the toilet in the middle of the night,” she tells Strong Women. “Viv [Miedema, her girlfriend and Arsenal teammate] seems to be the heaviest sleeper out of the two of us right now, so I’m doing a little bit more. I had to do a lot last night. But she only got back from international duty yesterday, so I can let her off.”

Considering it was Miedema’s Netherlands team who shut down England’s dreams of Olympic qualifications on Tuesday night, we don’t linger on that subject for long. But it was only a couple of months ago when the pair were sat watching the Women’s World Cup, unable to compete for their respective teams due to the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries they developed during last year’s WSL season. 

Since then, they’ve been through a lot as a couple: a journey that’s being brought to life as part of a new documentary series from Arsenal, Step By Step. Just one month after her injury, Mead was named BBC Sports Personality of the Year for her performance in England’s winning team at the 2022 Euros, before later being awarded an MBE in the new year honours list. Then, in January, she faced a monumental blow, losing her “best friend” – her mum, June – to ovarian cancer. Dealing with a gruelling rehab process at the same time as trying to navigate her grief made the last 12 months particularly tough.

“I couldn’t get out my anger and emotion through football, which was really difficult,” she explains. “I’m a bubbly person; I’ve got a big personality, but that was taken away from me. I feel very blessed to have the support system I do though, whether that’s my family back home or my family at Arsenal. Every single person who was around me and knew me and how I was at that time was incredible in keeping me above water; the Arsenal girls gave me my energy and that bit of life back.” 

Physically, getting back on the pitch hasn’t been an easy journey either. On top of all the rehab, which she admits became “tedious” at times, Mead has been diligent when it comes to keeping track of external factors like stress levels and nutrition. It’s a habit she’s kept up from before her injury, but something she now pays attention to even more.

“During the pandemic, I really homed in on my exercise, nutrition and sleep, but I wasn’t tracking it like I do now with my Whoop,” says Mead, who is now an ambassador for the brand.

“As athletes we do everything to a T and obsess over the little things to become the best. I’ve tracked everything – whether that’s my sleep, stress levels or strain when I was doing different sessions. It’s now part of my daily routine. Sometimes you have to trust your body and get to know what things are best to do and what aren’t, but tracking has helped me with that.” 

Keeping an eye on her sleep, in particular, has been incredibly important, even if the puppy now wakes her up at night. “I’m a big sleep person – I believe it’s the best form of recovery. It’s the one time your body is switched off completely. It’s one of the most regular things I track on my Whoop.”

Another area of tracking that’s becoming increasingly important in the women’s game is menstrual tracking, allowing athletes and their teams to monitor the impact of the menstrual cycle on performance and all-around wellbeing. We know, for example, that the spike in energy that occurs during the follicular phase – when your body is preparing to release an egg – can increase performance. Apps like FitrWoman and Jessica Ennis-Hill’s Jennis Cycle Mapping already provide athletes with the opportunity to train with their cycle in mind, but research into the benefits is still ongoing. I ask Mead whether this is something she incorporates into her training plan.

“We’ve done a lot of stuff at Arsenal recently, and in January we’re actually starting a three-month plan with a menstrual cycle specialist, so hopefully we’ll get some good data from that. It’s about understanding that everybody is different – some people are on their period for longer, some people are regular while other people aren’t. It’s another tool to understand more about yourself and how we all respond differently and find out what works best for you.” 

Research wise, there’s another area of development we need to talk about – ACL injuries. Two days before we speak, Uefa announced it would be launching an initiative to investigate and better understand the prevalence of ACL injuries in the women’s game. As far as the number of players affected, Arsenal has been at the centre of this so-called ‘ACL epidemic’, with Mead and Miedema being joined on the bench by England captain Leah Williamson and defender Laura Wienroither later in the season. In the opening games of the current WSL season, Manchester United defender Gabby George became yet another ACL victim. Until now, efforts to understand why the women’s game has been so plagued by the injury have fallen short, perhaps because so many different factors are at play.

But as far as the research goes, Mead says it’s about time. “It’s such a hard topic because there’s no definitive answer as to why it happens – it’s not like you can plug yourself in like a car and do an MOT and identify what’s wrong. There are so many factors that can play a part. Obviously, my injury was contact, whereas the other three girls who injured theirs were non-contact. But it does seem to be happening more regularly, so I’m happy that they’ve started to do more research into it.” 

This need for more research is something Mead has been vocal about over the last year, and will no doubt continue to back now she’s back on the pitch. ACL injuries aren’t something you can heal and move on from, no matter how much work you put into recovery. And as happy as she is to be back on the pitch, Mead acknowledges that it’s not all plain sailing.

I ask her whether her approach to injury prevention and self-care has changed compared to what it looked like pre-ACL. “It’s had to,” she laughs. “Although I feel great, my new normal looks a little different. I’ve got a stiff knee when I wake up; I have to do certain exercises in the gym to support my knee, and I’ve got tendonitis because I had a patellar tendon graft. I know that I have to do certain things to optimise my level of performance and get my knee in the best shape. A long time ago this injury made you retire, so I still feel very lucky that I can play football at a good level after having this injury.” 

Ultimately, Mead is back in business. It’s been a long road, but she’s back doing what she loves – scoring goals, training with her teammates and being the centre of the action. The last couple of weeks may have been a rollercoaster of ups and downs, from scoring her first goals for club and country in over a year to missing out on Olympics qualification, but it’s something she’s used to after everything that’s happened over the past 12 months.

“It’s been a whirlwind of emotions, coming back,” she says. “I was nervous for my first game, but there was also so much excitement. I’ve just worked so hard for the 10 months I was off the pitch, and there were days when I felt so low and just wanted to give up and have a good cry. But coming back on that pitch and getting that feeling of being able to do it all again? That made it worthwhile.” 

Beth Mead is a Whoop ambassador. For more information visit www.whoop.com.

Images: Getty; Whoop