Australian hurdler Michelle Jenneke has revealed she competed in the repechage with a ruptured hamstring tendon.
Jenneke suffered what was originally thought to be a knee injury after crashing into the third hurdle during her heat.
The 31-year-old bravely got to her feet and completed the race, which meant she was able to contest the repechage round.
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Jenneke performed her trademark jiggle and had a smile on her face ahead of the repechage, but clearly something was wrong.
She finished last with a time of 13.86 seconds.
“Pretty brave to be out there,” Gerard Whateley said in commentary.
Jenneke told Nine after the race that she had a ruptured hamstring and it was “kind of a miracle that I was out here today.”
She later expanded on the injury when speaking to reporters.
“Firstly I’m really proud of myself,” Jenneke said.
“I ran today with one less hamstring than usual and obviously that was pretty difficult, but … I said to the doctor, ‘Can I still run?’
“I didn’t want my Olympic campaign to end the way it was yesterday and I really just wanted to give it my all today.
“I knew that making that semi-final and running under 12 seconds missing one of your hamstrings is probably pretty impossible, but I wanted to prove to myself and the rest of Australia that I’ve got grit in me and I’m not going to give up easily.
“The general consensus was that it’s a full rupture so I can’t make that any worse, so provided I was still hurdling in a way that wasn’t jeopardising other parts of my body, if I wanted to race then I had the all-clear to do that.”
Knowing she had next to no chance of advancing to the semi-finals, Jenneke was just happy to have another race.
There’s every chance this will be her last Olympics, having missed Tokyo through injury.
“Everyone was pretty on board with me running today,” the two-time Olympian said.
“It’s the Olympics and you do everything you can to show up on that start line.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be fast; this one was all about proving what it takes to get back up.
“I stood out there and I was soaking it all in and I was having a great time, despite everything that was going on with my body. I’m always going to do it because that’s what I do when I’m enjoying myself.”
Fellow Australians Liz Clay and Celeste Mucci also came up short in their repechage heats.
Jenneke will likely have surgery on the ruptured hamstring when she gets home but remains keen to push on at least until next year’s world championships in Tokyo.
Tokyo Olympics fourth-placegetter Peter Bol and national record holder Joseph Deng were both run out in the 800m repechage round.
Young countryman Peyton Craig had advanced straight to the semis after finishing third in his opening-round heat on Wednesday.
– With AAP
