Crowning glory awaits Britain's golden girl

Odds-on favourite to win BBC Sports Personality, Keely Hodgkinson never doubted she was ready to conquer the world

- MALIK OUZIA

To middle-distance runners, false starts tend to be viewed as needless acts of unforgivable idiocy. Looking back on that which began her golden year, though, Keely Hodgkinson would come to see only a blessing in disguise. The plan had been for a busy winter of indoor racing, culminating in a bid for glory at the World Championships in Glasgow, the perfect springboard for the potentially career-defining summer ahead. Then along came a knee injury. There would be no rushing back for Glasgow, nor any indoor season at all. The decision was made by Hodgkinson and her husband and wife coaching team of Trevor Painter and Jenny Meadows, and taken with one date and place in mind: August 5, Stade de France, Paris.

It is startling just how forthright Hodgkinson was in talking up the single parameter for success in 2024. There was no trepidation at the prospect of setting oneself up to fail, no having been burnt by near-misses before. Only the swagger and no-bullshit aura that has been the 22-year-old's trademark ever since her teenage breakthrough.

"Not every athlete goes out there racing to become Olympic champion," says Dame Kelly Holmes. The last British woman before Hodgkinson to hold that title over 800 metres is joining Standard Sport to look back on her successor's triumphant year, one expected to end, as with Holmes's 20 years ago, with the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award next week. "You might go out there to run a fast time, or to medal. Back in the day, somebody getting a bronze was bloody brilliant, you'd be idolising them. Colin Jackson never won a gold medal at the Olympics. But for Keely, she only wanted gold in Paris. There was no silver in her head. It wasn't even contemplated."

Win any race, in any way