'I miss racing so much' - Rhasidat Adeleke outlines injury woes and targets reset in 2026

The Dubliner was below her best during the summer, clocking 50.4 seconds twice for 400m in June, down on her Irish record of 49.07, and she followed that up with a 51.33 in Oregon in July.

Sat, 13 Dec, 2025 - 06:37

Cathal Dennehy

Rhasidat Adeleke has said a hamstring strain led to her withdrawal from the World Championships in September, one of “several issues” that hampered her performances throughout the season.

“I just wasn't able to get a consistent training cycle,” she told RTÉ Sport during a visit to St Mark's Junior National School in Tallaght on Friday. “It was several different injuries, from hamstring to groin to knee. They are all stimulating from a condition that I have and we are just trying to make sure that everything is managed and maintained.”

Adeleke said it was a “last-minute decision” to opt out of the Tokyo World Championships after straining her hamstring – her third hamstring injury across the year. “So we had decided to call it quits for the season because it would have taken me too long to get back into shape.”

She has since recovered and has been back in hard training at the University of Texas, where she’s been based since 2021 under coach Edrick Floreal. “Training has been going so well for the last few weeks,” she said. “We have been making the relevant adjustments that I needed to make.”

The Dubliner was below her best during the summer, clocking 50.4 seconds twice for 400m in June, down on her Irish record of 49.07, and she followed that up with a 51.33 in Oregon in July. She turned in an improved performance of 22.52 for 200m a fortnight later at the London Diamond League but that was her last competitive outing of the summer, Adeleke announcing she was ending her season in mid-August, citing “lingering injuries” and “continuous setbacks”.

The lack of specifics about her injuries led to much speculation, with Sonia O’Sullivan writing in her Irish Times column that her “first concern for Rhasidat Adeleke right now is that she’s not being entirely open or honest,” adding: “I don’t understand why she’s being so secretive about it.”

In an interview with OffTheBall on Friday, Adeleke addressed the reaction to her withdrawal from Tokyo. “Because I’m naturally a bit more of a private person, I don’t over-explain myself in everything that I do,” she said. “I communicated that I was injured and I thought that’d be enough, and it was enough for a lot of people, which I definitely appreciate.

“But seeing the blow back was kind of interesting because I hadn’t really seen that happen to any other athletes. I just said, ‘You know what? This is what comes with the territory, people are going to always have stuff to say.’ You just have to go with it, really.”

Adeleke said “so many people from different countries” had contacted her about the criticism she was receiving online, saying: “Honestly, I just tried to ignore it. People were very angry on my behalf though, so I let them do the talking. I said, ‘These things happen. It’s not the first, it probably won’t be the last.’ People are going to have things to say, sometimes they’re not nice and you just have to [get on with it]. That’s my mindset. It’s unfortunate, but there’s not much I can say.”

Looking to 2026, she said the European Championships in Birmingham in August and the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest in September will be her two chief goals and while she may do some races indoors, she didn’t say if the World Indoors in Poland in March are in her plans.

“I miss racing so much, putting my spikes on and getting on the track and having that competitive mindset again,” she told RTÉ. “I'm excited and hopefully it’s a year for amazing things... 2025 taught me a lot.”