FEAR. It’s perhaps the most important component in the success of Jamaican sprint darling Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.

It’s hardly the impetus that one would expect. But for the diminutive 26-year-old Olympic and World 100m champion, having escaped the clutches of the harsh tarmac of one of Jamaica’s volatile communities in Waterhouse, Kingston, it’s the very thought of losing her current success and returning to a reality of not being able to provide for herself and her loved ones that is most terrifying.

Ann Fraser-Pryce

Fraser-Pryce, who on Saturday was presented with the IAAF World Female Athlete of the Year award, held nothing back as she gave a look into her thoughts during an intimate press point with a small group of journalists gathered here for the IAAF Gala and Awards Ceremony.

Raised in a single-parent household and surrounded by violence and poverty, track and field proved a well-needed conduit to opportunity for Fraser-Pryce and her mother, who had spent much of her life struggling as a vendor to fend for her daughter.

Now, after rising from obscurity and grabbing the attention of the world with a 100m gold medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Fraser-Pryce continues to engrave a name for herself in the sport; winning her first World title a year later, also in the 100m.

The ‘Pocket Rocket’, as she is affectionately called, bounced back in 2012 after a low-keyed 2011 World Championships, successfully defending her Olympic 100m title and placing second in her first attempt over 200m at a major championship.

This season, she distanced herself from her peers, winning three gold medals at the World Championships in Moscow in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m, took the Diamond League race in the 100m and 200m and also ended the season as the fastest woman in both events, registering one of the most-dominating performances from a female sprinter on the books.

Not bad for a girl that was running around in the ghetto not too long ago.

However, as Fraser-Pryce explained, going back to poverty and not being able to fend for herself and her family is what keeps her driven – her past a constant reminder that only the present can secure her future.

“I have been in the situation, I am coming from a single parent, a one-room situation, and I know how difficult it can be,” Fraser-Pryce said. “I have that thing, I feel that once I become complacent everything will just fall, so I never allow myself to unwind and have a vacation. There is never a vacation, if I am out of training for a month on vacation, within a week I start to jog or do abs or something like that.