It’s a tribute to Hodgkinson’s maturity and character that, even at this stage in her profession, she is anticipated to win each race she contests.
The ‘massive three’ have dominated latest international podiums, however till Monday Hodgkinson was the one one nonetheless but to triumph.
It was Mu who denied Hodgkinson in Tokyo, and once more by 0.08 seconds on the 2022 worlds in Eugene, earlier than Moraa beat each athletes in 2023 to improve her 2022 bronze to gold.
However that sequence of close to misses has solely served to accentuate the tenacious Hodgkinson’s willpower.
Quite than demoralise, it has pushed her on in pursuit of perfection, with this her ninth worldwide medal.
Hodgkinson has not often relented since first making headlines by breaking a 17-year under-20 indoor 800m world report firstly of 2021, earlier than securing her Olympic debut the place she broke Kelly Holmes’ 1995 British report.
She asserted herself additional as gold medal favorite in Paris by bettering her private finest to 1 minute 54.61 seconds on the London Diamond League in June, turning into the sixth-fastest girl in historical past.
Having made that golden promise to herself in Budapest, Hodgkinson saved her phrase in Paris.
“Keely was prepared for it, she needed to race good. It was so tense, however she delivered,” Denise Lewis mentioned on BBC TV.
“To listen to these phrases, ‘Olympic champion’, when it rings by her ears, that feeling, that second, that can reside on eternally in her head.
“It’s that feeling of aid. That feeling is simply so candy, it is so wonderful.”
