Sharp storms off as she fails to fire in heats

LyNSey ShARp stormed off track after blowing her chance of even contending for a medal in the 800metres. But the Glasgow 2014 silver medallist insisted she had worked harder than ever in her bid to succeed on the Gold Coast. Sharp (below) completely blew up on the home straight as she finished fourth in her heat, missing out on a place in the final. The 27-year-old, who has another crack at a medal as part of the 4x400 relay, broke with protocol by refusing to speak to any of the waiting media — including the official Games News Service — and left the stadium without a word. The San Diego-based athlete took to social media later in a bid to explain away her loss, saying: ‘I have worked my ass off the last few months to get myself into the best shape I have ever been in. ‘I threw everything into this. I’ve worked harder than I ever have before. Dug deeper. Took risks. pushed myself out my comfort zone. I was so hungry for this. ‘But this sport is cut-throat. Being in the shape of your life is not enough. you have to be firing on all cylinders. ‘It comes down to the smallest of margins and today I didn’t have enough to get it done. ‘It hurts. A lot. But the biggest lessons are learnt from failing. And I needed to learn this lesson. ‘I’m disappointed I couldn’t represent Scotland as well as I would have liked, but I will put my head down and work even harder to do better next time.’ Jake Wightman, meanwhile, came agonisingly close to a first major championships medal in his back-up event here — but was left ruing a ‘horrible’ fourth-place finish in the 800m final. Wightman appeared to have left Australia’s Luke Matthews behind in the battle for bronze on a busy closing straight. But the home favourite, roared on by the partisan crowd, somehow found an extra gear to recover and deny the Scot at the line. Wightman, who was due to go in the 1,500m heats in the early hours of this morning, said: ‘When I went past Luke, I thought he was dying. ‘The pace he came back at was more than I was expecting. I didn’t have anything to respond to. ‘he definitely would have found something from that roar. But when I went past I was sure that was him done. ‘I fought all the way to the line but it’s a horrible way to end up. ‘I don’t think I did too much wrong. I thought I ran all right. I just didn’t expect that to happen at the end. It’s pretty gutting. ‘you never come into a champs looking at finishing fourth. ‘you don’t want to finish anything but the win. ‘A medal is just a consolation, which would have been nice. Fourth is just horrible.’