In 2017, Dan Keatings retired from artistic gymnastics, having seen success a number of times for Team GB and Team Scotland, and trained at Lilleshall during his peak competitive years, followed by Huntingdon Olympic Gymnastics Club. Dan made history in 2009 for being the first British gymnast to win a World All-Around medal, having won Silver at The O2 Arena in London at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships, and for Team Scotland, he competed at his second Commonwealth Games in 2014, this time in front of a home crowd in Glasgow, becoming Pommel Horse champion (with Max Whitlock in Silver and Louis Smith in Bronze) and taking Silver in the All-Around and Team events. Having become the first British gymnast to win Gold on the Pommel Horse at the senior European Championships in 2013, Dan competed the following year in Sofia, where he won Team Silver with his British teammates Sam Oldham, Daniel Purvis, Kristian Thomas and Max Whitlock. Dan was selected alongside Louis Smith to compete at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games as the only two male gymnasts for Team GB, where he qualified for the All-Around final, and with his success as an artistic gymnast over the years, he will always be known as one of the best British gymnasts of all-time, in particular on the Pommel Horse. We found out from Dan about being a successful artistic gymnast over the years for Team GB and Team Scotland, competing at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games alongside Louis Smith, making history as the first British gymnast to win a World All-Around medal the following year at The O2 Arena in London and becoming Pommel Horse champion at the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
You retired from artistic gymnastics in 2017, how did you feel making the announcement?
It was obviously nerve-racking, but the time was definitely right. Since the beginning of 2015 I was struggling with a few different injuries that I couldn’t seem to get over.
How did you find the transition from being a full-time gymnast to retirement, and is there anything you miss most about having a gymnastics career and being on the Great Britain squad?
The transition is really hard. Once you retire, you realise gymnastics is all you have ever known and you are thrown into the world with no real working experience so it takes time. You feel like you lose your identity as you are no longer ‘Dan the gymnast’ and find yourself having to quickly find a new career.
To start with, I didn’t really miss gymnastics, but with every year that passes by, I miss it more and more. I love gymnastics, the adrenaline rush I’d get from trying new skills in the gym to competing on the highest stage is probably what I miss the most. As well as training with my best friends. I’m lucky I still have a good relationship with my old teammates. We still speak every week and meet up a few times a year.
Can you tell us what a typical training day looked like for you during your peak competitive years and how was it training at Huntingdon Olympic Gymnastics Club?
My training at Huntingdon was very different to when I trained and lived at Lilleshall. The convenience of Lilleshall made focusing on the small 1% so much easier.
For example, Huntingdon was an hour commute each way, Lilleshall I lived onsite, I had access to physios and doctors on site at Lilleshall, as well as all of my food and everything I needed for recovery, whereas at Huntingdon, to get everything I needed, I was constantly travelling.
My day at Huntingdon would start at 12pm, training during mums and toddler sessions, so we had to be cautious of small children running around. I would do two sessions, with the last finishing at 8pm so I wouldn’t be home until after 9pm. Lilleshall, during my peak, I would start the day with some bike cardio in the morning before breakfast, then start training at 9:30am and would train until around 1/1:30pm. We would then have lunch and start again at 3:30pm until around 6pm. We would then finish training with approximately an hour of weights in the weights gym. Then end the day with dinner and recovery like physio/massage, saunas and ice baths.
Having represented Team GB at many World Artistic Gymnastics Championships during your career, what were these competitions like to compete at?
I loved the World Championships as it’s the highest standard competition, competing against the best athletes in the world. I loved having the chance to showcase my gymnastics at this level. Qualifications was really nerve-racking, whereas finals I always enjoyed.
In 2009, you made history by being the first British gymnast to win a World All-Around medal, when you won Silver at The O2 Arena in London, what do you remember most from this competition and how was it collecting your medal in front of a home crowd?
I absolutely loved that competition, it’s one of my best memories from my career. I was still young at only 19 years old and it was my first full year as a senior competitor. I competed in Beijing the year before but I was still a junior and competed in a Junior Euros at the beginning of 2008.
I didn’t really know what to expect, I was just going there to enjoy the journey, but when I qualified in 4th with a fall on my pommel dismount, all of a sudden I realised there was a potential for me to make the podium and medal. I had no falls in the finals, just a couple of small errors such as stepping out of the floor and a small error on the p bars, but being in front of the home crowd really pulled me through.
I do remember one funny thing actually – we got to high bar, my last piece, and my coach Paul said “just make sure you get your squat half over the bar and take a small deduction, just get through” and I remember laughing and saying “I’m not taking any deductions”, and during my routine my squat half caught exactly in handstand with two or three bounces and was on the edge of falling the wrong way, and when it went the right way I remember having a big sigh of relief and thinking Paul’s going to kill me!
Collecting the medal in front of the home crowd was an amazing feeling and something I will never forget. I also won the Elegance award from Longines, which was the icing on the cake.
After making your Commonwealth debut for Team Scotland at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne at the age of 16, you competed again in front of a home crowd in Glasgow in 2014; how did you find the experience representing Scotland at two Commonwealth Games and what was it like becoming the Pommel Horse champion and winning All-Around and Team Silvers in 2014 for your final Commonwealth Games?
2006 was an amazing experience and something that prepared me for the bigger competitions later in my career. 2014 was unbelievable, I missed out on the 2012 Olympics so this was the home games I didn’t get to experience.
It was like my redemption being able to pick up the Pommel Horse title in front of two Olympic medallists from 2012 – Max (Whitlock) and Louis (Smith), this was one of my best achievements.
The Team medal was historic as Team Scotland had never medalled before in men’s gymnastics, so to pick up the Silver medal was an incredible achievement, and doing it in Scotland was something we were so proud of.
I wasn’t sure what to expect from the All-Around as I only started doing it again earlier that year to help the team because in 2012 I hurt both of my ankles really badly and didn’t train floor or vault for two years, so to come out with the Silver medal exceeded my expectations.
How was your time competing at the European Artistic Gymnastics Championships in 2014 in Sofia, which saw you come away with Team Silver alongside your British teammates Sam Oldham, Daniel Purvis, Kristian Thomas and Max Whitlock?
The 2014 European Championships was a mixture of emotions. We had a great team competition going head to head with Russia, who edged it on the day. We were all proud to be stood on the podium after putting in a great team performance. Individually, I was disappointed as I was coming into that Euros as the current European champion on Pommel, but for some reason was marked down on my pommel routine in qualifications, even though I had no errors, and unfortunately didn’t make the final.
You were the first British gymnast to win Gold on the Pommel Horse at the senior European Championships, what did this medal, as your first major Championships Gold medal, mean to you?
That was awesome as it, again, was in front of a home crowd in Birmingham in 2010 and continued my success from the 2009 Worlds the year before. In 2013, when I did it again, it meant a lot to me also as I beat the 2012 Olympic champion (Krisztián) Berki and the Bronze medallist Whitlock to the title.
What are some of your favourite memories from competing at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games (where you and Louis Smith were the only male competitors for Team GB) and qualifying for the All-Around final?
Beijing was crazy – the whole Olympic experience is just surreal. Me and Louis were both so young, we were told to just take it all in and enjoy the experience. Competing with the gymnasts I looked up to in the All-Around final was incredibly fun and I found myself watching their routines as a fan whilst waiting for my turn on the apparatus. Beijing was also the time that Usain Bolt first broke the world record and it was the craziest thing to see.
Looking back at your hugely-successful gymnastics career, what competitions stand out to you as the most memorable, and were there any you found most challenging?
My favourite competitions were the 2009 Worlds, 2014 Commonwealths and the Beijing Olympics. They are my three favourites.
The 2011 World Champs in Tokyo was my toughest competition as I had got injured after 2010 Euros. I ruptured my ACL and was out for the best part of a year so it was my first major competition back. There was a lot of pressure on that competition and I had upped my routines on every single apparatus. The whole time it was “Dan’s back” and how I was going to try and go head to head with (Kōhei) Uchimura as it was the first time competing again since Worlds 2009. I had an absolute nightmare having around four falls. I think I had upped my routines too much and the added pressure of the expectation I just fell apart. Not just me but the team did as well as it was our chance to qualify a team to the Olympics for the first time. All of us had a nightmare and ended up having to go to the test event in January 2012 to try and grab one of the last team places, which we did.
How does it feel knowing you were a trailblazer for British Gymnastics and remembered as one of the best British gymnasts, particularly on the Pommel Horse, of all-time?
It feels great and people still constantly remind me of that. It feels amazing that I was one of the people that started it all and installed belief throughout Great Britain that we can compete with the very best.
How has it been seeing Team GB’s continued success in artistic gymnastics, and how have you stayed involved with sports since retiring?
It’s amazing to see the guys still doing so well. I had a complete break from gymnastics when I retired but I try to keep up as much as possible now. The current guys are unbelievable and it’s great to see them picking up Olympic, World and Euro titles and medals across the board. Jake Jarman was just a young kid with crazy potential training in Huntingdon when I was there, so it’s awesome seeing him do the incredible things he’s doing now and fulfilling the potential we all knew he had.
How did you originally get into artistic gymnastics and was it always something you wanted to do at elite level?
My dad was a kickboxer and originally wanted me to follow in his footsteps and at age five I was too young to start, so he put me into gymnastics to get me strong and flexible ready to start kickboxing when I was seven. I got good really quickly in gymnastics so ended up pursuing that as a career, winning my first national title at eight years old.
Were there any gymnasts that inspired you when growing up, and are there any current gymnasts (either from Team GB or internationally) that you particularly enjoy watching now?
(Alexei) Nemov when I was young, but then (Hiroyuki) Tomita was my favourite gymnast. I remember in Beijing I missed the pommel final by the tiniest margin because I missed a circle on one handle which brought my start score down by 0.1. I was 1st reserve and Tomita had come off rings and hurt his shoulder so he wasn’t training so I thought I could be in! So I warmed up pommel on the day of finals and he turned up just before and competed. I was gutted, but as he was my favourite gymnast I’ll let him off ha-ha!!
The current GB boys are all so good and I love watching them. I love the competition of Jake, Luke (Whitehouse) and Harry (Hepworth) on floor as it reminds me of myself, Max and Louis on pommel and the competition you give each other makes you raise your game and ends up pushing you to do incredible things.
What advice would you give a new gymnast starting out?
My advice would be to have fun with it and don’t put too much pressure on yourself. If you can fall in love with the sport and really enjoy it, the long hours training isn’t a chore, you will just love being there.
How do you like to spend your free time?
Right now, I love CrossFit style training and spending time with my friends and family. I’m a bit of a social butterfly and just love being around people. I also love extreme sports or anything that gives me a huge adrenaline rush.
What are you hoping the upcoming year brings for you?
At the time of writing this, I’m in the hospital with my wife, who is soon to give birth! So really looking forward to having a second son and enjoying time with him and my wife Steph and other son Elijah. Elijah is becoming a bit of a sportsman himself and is doing well in a lot of different sports so looking forward to supporting that and seeing where it goes.
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