Athens agony: Olympic hopes over but Sonia goes the distance

“MAYBE I’ve had my time,” a noble though defeated Sonia O’Sullivan said last night when she ran her last Olympic race.

She was lapped and she was last, but O’Sullivan still made it to Athens and, despite a mild illness, went the distance in the 5,000m final.

While having no intention of retiring from competitive sports, she admitted that Athens was her last Olympics.

The holder of 11 major championship gold and silver medals who is recognised as being Ireland’s greatest track athlete, thanked the fans who last night cheered her every footfall. “I have to thank all the supporters who were in the stand tonight, without them I would not have finished the race.

“It’s hard for me to say this but this was possibly my last Olympic track race. It’s one of those things where you come in with great hope and expectations and things don’t always work out the way you want them to.”

At no point did the woman who took the silver at the Sydney Olympics look like a medal contender. One and a half laps into the race she began to fall back from the pack. At the mid-stage she was 150 metres behind the second last in the field.

Explaining why she did not look very comfortable from the start, the Cobh woman said that for the past two days she was feeling sick.

“It’s something that I thought was a simple thing, but obviously maybe not. These are the Olympic Games and if you are a tiny bit off form it shows, and it showed out there tonight as soon as the pace was anything like it should be.

“I came here to do my best and I got to the final, but now I’m going to have to find somewhere else to get my happy memories.”

Sonia finished last of 15 competitors. At the tail end of the race almost the entire field had lapped her, an undeserving curtain closer to an otherwise spectacular sporting career.

Sonia finished in a time of 16:20.9 secs. She won a standing ovation from a large Irish presence in the crowd as she pulled out all the stops to run the psychologically punishing final stage of the race. A tearful Sonia waved at her fans in her inspiring more than humiliating approach to the line.