Athletics: Hollman's hallmark is all-round strength

Manchester 2002: A new face in the event Denise Lewis made her golden own is fast gaining world recognition

Julie Hollman could not help laughing as she settled into her chair and pondered the opening question. "What are the chances," she had been asked, "of getting through this interview without the Olympic heptathlon champion being mentioned?"

"Probably none," she replied.

For the rising new British star of the heptathlon, there is no escaping the golden shadow of Denise Lewis. Just across the street from our rendezvous in Starbucks, next to the entrance to Peterborough Cathedral, Lewis's face is the first you see as you walk into W H Smith. Britain's greatest all-round female athlete is on the cover of the new Radio Times.

She is not, however, going to be in Manchester a week on Friday to defend her Commonwealth crown. Hollman will be in the City of Manchester Stadium to contest the heptathlon. And, judging by her form this year, it is not difficult to imagine the little-known lass from the Lincolnshire village of Deeping St James, a sleepy hamlet five miles north of Peterborough, emerging victorious from the seven-event competition and suddenly being hailed as the new Denise Lewis.

"Well," she said, considering the prospect, "I just hope I'm treated as myself. I want to be the new Julie Hollman, as such. I don't want to be compared to Denise all the time. I mean, it's nice to have that comparison, but she's totally different to me. The only comparison is that we do the same event and that we've had the same coach. She's a great athlete. She's got all her strengths and I've got my weaknesses – and, well, some of my strengths – that I'm working on."

For the time being, Hollman is working on her weaknesses and on her burgeoning strengths as the best-kept secret in British athletics. She is ranked No 1 in the Commonwealth and No 7 in the world, which is more than Dwain Chambers, the British star of the season so far, can say. He is ranked joint second in the Commonwealth and joint eighth in the world in the 100m.

It just happens that, outside of the major championships, heptathlons – and their male counterpart decathlons – are contested far from the madding crowds and the media spotlight. In Manchester it will be different. The stadium will be filled to its 38,000 capacity and the spotlight will be on full glare.

Hollman's many talents will shine too, if she maintains the world-class level of performances she has started to show this year under the expert guidance of Darrell Bunn, the Birmingham coach who guided Lewis to the Commonwealth title in 1994 and to the Commonwealth and European crowns in 1998, before Charles van Commenee steered her to Olympic gold in Sydney. In her second year working with Bunn, Hollman has stepped up into the ranks of the global élite.

In May she won the Multistars competition at Desenzano in Italy, beating Natalya Roshchupkina, the Russian who finished fourth in the world championships last year, and, nominally at least, the Russian world champion, Yelena Prokhorova, who was leading the competition until she withdrew from the final event, the 800m, suffering from a twisted knee. It was a major breakthrough for Hollman, not least because she broke through the 6,000-points barrier for the first time, with 93 points to spare.

In June she improved to 6,135 points in the annual combined-events meeting in Gotzis, the Austrian town where Daley Thompson broke the decathlon world record 20 years ago. In doing so, she finished fifth in a competition regarded as the most prestigious outside of the major championships. The 25-year-old sports science graduate stands on top of the Commonwealth rankings by a margin of 131 points. She does not, however, consider it a formality that she will finish on top of the medal podium in Manchester. Far from it.

"Yes, I have looked at the rankings," Hollman confessed, somewhat reluctantly. "But you can't just look at the list and say, 'Right, she's going to win'. The heptathlon's such a difficult event. Over those two days, anything can happen – injury, anything. Before Gotzis, I'd been working really hard on my shot and my javelin and they turned out to be my worst two events. So you just can't predict anything. I know it's going to be close. It's just who's in shape at the time, and who's lucky enough to pull it through."

Such caution is only sensible. The world ranking list for 2002 doesn't take into account such factors as the rapid improvement being made by the 19-year-old Ghanaian Margaret Simpson, who finished 13th at the world championships in Edmonton last summer and who has now improved to 6,004 points, or the return after injury of the 26-year-old Australian Jane Jamieson. She finished 10th in the Olympic heptathlon two years ago and has a personal best of 6,354 points, which she set when taking the Commonwealth silver medal behind Lewis in Kuala Lumpur in 1998.

"This is my first major championship," Hollman added. "I just want to go there, get the experience and perform well. I'm not thinking too much about the medals. I just want to carry on what I've been doing already this summer." What Hollman has been doing is finally fulfilling the potential she first showed 10 years ago when she was picked for the Great Britain Under-20 team at the age of 15. She has been reaping the rewards of two years working with Bunn, shuttling between Deeping and Birmingham twice a week, developing within the framework of a training system that also includes sessions with Mike McNeil, the Peterborough javelin coach who has guided Goldie Sayers to a European junior silver medal, and expert help from Brian Welsby, the Peterborough nutritionist who has fuelled Lewis and Paula Radcliffe to world-beating deeds.

"Everything has just sort of come together," Hollman mused. "It hasn't just suddenly happened. It all feels a bit weird, though... breaking 6,000 points, winning in Desenzano, beating Roshchupkina, doing well in Gotzis, and now the Commonwealths. It's a bit surreal... it's just nice to be in contention at last."

For the time being at least, the reigning Commonwealth, European and Olympic heptathlon champion is out of contention. Hollman, however, expects Lewis to return following the pregnant pause in which she has given birth to a daughter and split from her coach, Van Commenee. "Denise is very determined," Hollman said. "I think she'll be back." Whether she comes back to find another British golden girl of the heptathlon remains to be seen.