Teenage kick fires new star into the big time
KEELY HODGKINSON insists she is ready for the spotlight and knows her stunning 800metres Olympic silver medal-winning performance will change her life.
The 19-year-old clocked one minute, 55.88 seconds to smash Dame Kelly Holmes’ British record, which had stood for 26 years, and finish behind Athing Mu of the USA, also 19, in Tokyo.
That mark of 1min 56.21sec had stood since 1995 and Hodgkinson – who was unable to run at all for a time in her early teens due to a tumour which has left her deaf in one ear – became the
first British medal winner in the event since Holmes took gold in 2004.
Hodgkinson does not currently receive funding but knows her heroics in Japan will thrust her into the big time and insisted: ‘I’m ready.’
She went on: ‘I’m just going to keep on doing what I’m doing. Don’t fix
something if it’s not broken. What I’ve been doing the last year has got me to this point. If you don’t enjoy it everything becomes pressurised and hard work. As long as I keep doing what I’m doing and stay injury-free, hopefully there will be many more moments like this.’ Hodgkinson looked shocked by her achievement, saying ‘that is mental’ in response to being told she was an Olympic silver medallist and mouthed ‘what the f***’ to her team in the stands after finishing.
‘That race was so open and I wanted to put it all out there,’ said the Wigan athlete, who unleashed her trademark kick finish to surge into second to claim Team GB’s first athletics medal of the Games.
Britain came close to bronze too but Jemma Reekie was edged out by American Raevyn Rogers by 0.09sec.
It was the first time three British women had qualified for an Olympic 800m final, with Alex Bell finishing seventh in a personal-best 1:57.66.