A hank of blond hair blowing across her forehead in the stiff wind, a beaming face above an athletic physique that could grace an advertisement for a health food supplement, Andi Pauli looked the epitome of fitness at Henley last week as she prepared for the Women’s Boat Race on Easter Sunday. She appeared a woman absolutely in control of her destiny as her crew practised sustained bursts up the renowned Thames course in the spring sunshine.

Described by the Oxford coach Andy Green as “physically the strongest member of the crew, if a call comes to push, she will lead the charge”, the 31-year-old German is also ideally built to be at No 4, the engine room of the boat. She is 6ft tall, weighs 13st and rowed in the event last year. Off the water, she is even more accomplished with degrees from two German universities and she is now writing a doctorate in biochemistry, as well as being a gifted cellist. She seems a person blessed with limitless talent.

Yet, beneath this confident exterior, there is a traumatic story. Many of her crewmates have been totally unaware that just over 10 years ago, Pauli was so seriously ill with anorexia that her bodyweight plunged to 7½st and she was forced to spend five months in a clinic learning to eat properly again.

Green was completely taken aback when told two months ago about Pauli’s former condition, saying: “It was a ‘double take’ moment. I could scarcely believe it.” Pauli herself is gratified by the astonishment, saying: “I am quite happy that people do not realise it, because that shows me that I am normal again.”

To have survived such a searing personal experience seems to have strengthened her resolve as she prepares for the race, for which Oxford, as winners of the Head of the River Race, are unquestioned favourites.

Brought up in Munich, she was a keen club handball player as a teenager, but at 17 years of age, she ruptured an anterior cruciate ligament in her knee and was forced to stop the sport. This disappointment frustrated her wishes and triggered the anorexia. She explains: “I felt that if I didn’t do sport, then I should eat less and less. I was used to doing sport. Perhaps I wanted to punish myself. I’m not really sure. I was running and doing exercises such as press-ups and just eating less and less. It became a vicious circle. I just hated my life.”

Supported by her parents, she had to interrupt her studies and instead was admitted to a clinic in Munich, where she lived in a shared flat with other patients and went into daily group therapy. She recalls: “There were 24 of us, aged between 18 and 30, and we worked together in psychotherapy. Gradually I learnt to eat again, to have normal portions and enjoy my life, to be happy once more.”

Often, anorexia strikes the most driven and gifted of people whose obsessive nature can steer them towards the condition. Pauli says: “For me, it was about trying to be the best. I was always very good at school. Then suddenly I was not allowed to play handball. That was my big thing, with the team and the other people. I began punishing myself, my family and everyone. But I didn’t allow myself any help from them. I was completely blocking out everything.”

But she recovered. “It was gradual,” she says. “When you get out of the clinic, you have to take care of yourself when there is nobody around who is watching you to see if you are eating enough and what you are doing. It is up to you. It was not very easy. At that time, I thought I would never be able to eat normally, without really thinking about it. But that was some time ago and now it is over.”

She regards the experience in the clinic as a nightmare that is in her past. “I definitely do not want to go back there,” she says. She still keeps in touch with one other girl who was in the clinic with her, and, like Pauli, has also recovered. However, she adds: “Most of the others are still in the spiral.” It is a condition from which she is endlessly relieved to be released.

Pauli subsequently took a degree at Regensburg and then a Masters in molecular and cellular biology at Heidelberg before beginning her PhD in Vienna. She came to Britain when her mentor in Austria, Professor Kim Nasmyth, moved to Oxford.

She only began rowing two years ago, initially with the Merton College crew and then with the university, winning a Blue in 2007 and coming second in the university category at the national indoor championships.

On an ergometer, she did 6min 58sec for 2,000m, a time that would put her on the fringes of the British Olympic team. Clearly she would have had the ability to row with the German national squad, if she had started earlier. However, what was Germany’s loss has been Oxford’s gain.

Does she often think about her anorexia? Yes, she did, in the early years, but now much less frequently. Is rowing in the Boat Race, an event in which such Olympic medal winners as Cath Bishop, Alison Mowbray and Sarah Winckless have competed, a demonstration of her total recovery? She says: “A little bit for sure. One of the things I knew about Oxford was the Boat Race and rowing, Oxford against Cambridge. Then suddenly last year, I was in there, only a year after starting rowing. It was very surprising. Having been so ill, I never thought about training like this. When I was ill, I thought I would never be able to do sports any more. I would never enjoy training. Now I just love being normal, although I know rowing in the Boat Race is not normal. For me, you see, the race is the icing on the cake.”

Keeping a check on athletes

British athletics and gymnastics officials, worried about the health of their competitors, have been monitoring females’ bodyweight so that any suffering from anorexia will be identified and action quickly taken. Both sports have had cases in the past of leading figures becoming seriously ill

Following a report in 1997 that at least eight percent of Britain’s top middle and long-distance runners had suffered from anorexia or bulimia, the national body set up a multi-disciplinary panel to warn coaches and athletes of the dangers to health and performance when competitors lose excessive amounts of weight

UK Athletics has subsequently set up a regular monitoring system at all the High Performance Centres. A spokeswoman said: 'This support includes a performance nutritionist and clinical psychologist at every centre who work with athletes on a day-to-day basis. Additionally, we have excellent ties with the Eating Disorders Association'

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