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The health problem plaguing female Olympians as 'pee flies through air' during competition

Team GB Olympian Laura Gallagher Cox has opened up on a health problem that has plagued a number of female athletes throughout their careers, called stress incontinence.

Stress incontinence occurs following an accidental loss of urine through physical exertion, following damage to the pelvic floor over time.

The problem tends to arise in female athletes that take part in high impact sports, and is common in netball, gymnastics and trampolining.

Gallagher Cox - an Olympic trampoliner who competed in Tokyo - opened up in an interview with the Telegraph on how she struggled with the problem at just 15 years of age during a national competition.

Getty Images Laura Gallagher Cox discussed suffering the problem as a youngster

On the daunting experience at the national trampolining event, where she was finalising her preparations for the routine she would go onto perform minutes later, she said: “It completely destroyed my warm-up.

"I felt embarrassed. I went to the loo and sorted myself out and changed my leotard. People probably knew what had happened.”

The Olympian is not the only trampoliner to struggle, with the research revealing that it has affected up to 80 per cent of female athletes in the sport, according to the Telegraph report.

The 32-year-old went on to reveal just why it is common in trampolinists, commenting: “When we land from a jump, we put about 16 times our body weight through the trampoline. In terms of peeing, the worst time for it seems to be the younger girls just coming into puberty.

“I’ve been at competitions where I’ve seen girls pee as they take off – when they do a double back somersault you’ll genuinely see urine flying through the air.”

Gallagher Cox’s Team GB teammate Izzy Songhurst admitted she also suffered from the issue as a teenager, and has therefore worn a pad throughout her professional career to prevent a leak whilst competing.

Getty Images Gallagher Cox competed at the Tokyo Olympic Games

She said: “If you’re having a bad day, you do worry about whether your pad is showing through the back of your leotard or if it’s coming out the side.

“It causes a bit of uncomfortableness and anxiety, which can obviously be distracting and can throw you off.”

The problem was witnessed first hand at the 2005 World Championships after French gymnast Emilie Le Pennec urinated whilst competing at the event.

The same problem occurred for Ecuadorian weightlifter Maria Alexandra Escobar Guerrero at 2012 London Olympic Games, and on both occasions the two athletes were ridiculed online.

With stress incontinence a clear problem within female sport, former rower and women's health coach Baz Moffatt informed the Telegraph on how women can deal with the issue.

Moffatt said: “My recommendation would always be to just go simple first of all and try doing pelvic-floor exercises on your own. Women have no clue how to do pelvic-floor exercises – they’ve never been taught properly – so that’s a challenge. 

Reference:Mirror: Joshua Lees