Commonwealth Youth Games gold medallist Javier Bello has had a busy few months considering the nation has been on lockdown, with all sporting facilities shut to training and competition.

But what has been a mightily tricky time for everyone across the world, Javier Bello has been fully focused on finishing his assignments off during the second year of his Politics and Economics degree at Royal Holloway. Rather than focusing on Beach Volleyball,

“I’ve been revising and writing my assignments up because they all got moved online and meant they were all within one week of each other. The previous few weeks I was just focusing on that and trying to get as good a grade as possible and take advantage of the fact the exams were online. I’ve never been this long without training properly.”

Since winning a historic gold medal with his brother Joaquin in the Bahamas three years ago, Bello has been keen to replicate both the experience of a multiple sport games on the senior stage. With the Tokyo Olympics delayed a year, and the Birmingham Commonwealth Games just 12 months after that. Bello is set to hit the ground running, 

“It was a really good experience at the Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas in 2017, and the perfect way to prepare for the senior games. It’s a similar environment so it prepares you for a lot of the things which are different in a multi-sport games such as the size of the event itself and having to travel. So it won’t be as much of a shock when you are at the Commonwealth Games and preparing for life in the village or any of that kind of stuff.”

Bello has had his first small taste of senior Team England experience at the recent virtual kit panel which he and 22 other athletes from 17 of the 19 Commonwealth Sports took part in. This was the first meeting to discuss the initial kit designs which coincided with Kukri being announced as Commonwealth Games England’s kit supplier for Birmingham 2022. This first step on the road to Birmingham is something that excited Bello immensely,

“To have an opportunity to play in such a big event in front of all our friends and family who support us will be great. A lot of the big events we do on the World Tour are really far away from home, a few are in Europe but most aren’t even in Europe. So we really want to play in a home games as it is something really special and a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

Bello and his brother have begun training once again in Barnes, South West London. Despite being able to push each in lockdown by living under the same roof with their father who is also their coach. 

“It’s lucky that we have each other because we are actually able to train, the only thing we don’t have is the sand, so we go out in the garden and train out there. But we have a little home gym as well where we have some equipment so we tried to keep fit and maintain ourselves to ensure that we are going to be in the best possible shape. A lot of people are saying they are super jealous of my set up at home and a lot of people feel like they haven’t been doing enough, but I feel like I have been because I have my brother and my dad all under the same roof.”