Jessica Hull’s historic silver medal at the Paris Olympic Games is a testament to belief. No Australia woman had won a medal in the 1500m, but Hull believed not only that it was possible, but that she was the one who could do it, while taking on the greatest female 1500m runner in history, Kenya’s world record-holder and triple gold medallist Faith Kipyegon.
By the time the Olympic final started, she felt it was her destiny. Earlier in the day she had met up with her father and coach Simon and told him “I think I’m going to medal, I’ve just got a feeling”.
Hull, 27, is the first Australian to win an Olympic middle distance medal on the track for over half a century, since Ralph Doubell won gold in the 800m in Mexico City in 1968. She ran a smart tactical race, covering the early leaders and moving to Kipyegon’s shoulder at the bell, so she was in a good position to respond when the Kenyan surged on the back straight.
Hull shrugged off the challenge from Ethiopia’s top contender Diribe Welteji around the final bend and then surged for home, holding off Briton Georgia Bell’s (3:52.61) late charge to claim her hard-won Olympic medal.
‘It’s everything I’ve dreamed of,” she said. “I’ve wanted this for so long and just to finally realise it was like ‘oh, my goodness, I did it’. I’m really proud.”
She said she felt surprisingly calm when the kickdown came in the last 200m of the race. “It’s easy to doubt yourself, especially on this stage, but I just had to remind myself that every time I’ve asked my gears to be there this year, they have been, so I just had to trust that was going to happen today,” she said. “I knew I was going to get a medal, I just didn’t know what colour.”
Kipyegon set an Olympic record of 3:51.29 to win her third consecutive title, and Hull fought off the challenge from Bell to cross the finish line second in 3:52.56, her second fastest time.
“[Kipyegon] is just class – we’re getting closer but she’s still the next level and she’s the triple Olympic champion now, so if you are going to get beat by anybody, I’m more than happy for it to be her,” Hull said.
The Australian has been an athlete transformed since her fourth place finish in the 3000m at the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow in March, intent on getting herself onto the podium at global level.
She said that near-miss “lit a fire” inside her at the right time, with the Olympics just five months away. She felt she had run too conservatively in Glasgow, and vowed to take her fate into her own hands in future. At the same time, she and her father have focussed on building her speed over the last year so she could contend with the fastest women in the world over the metric mile.
When Kipyegon broke the 1500m world record at the Paris Diamond League in early July, Hull was the only athlete who tried to go with her and her reward was a huge personal best and Australian record (3:50.83), which lifted her to No 5 on the world all-time list. She backed that up by breaking the world record over 2000m in Monaco in her last race before she arrived in Paris, to confirm her outstanding form.
Hull first came to international attention as a college star at the famed track and field finishing school, the University of Oregon, which she attended on the advice of her father, but a year ago she decided to come home to Wollongong and resume the familial partnership.
“It’s just a different level of trust, a different bond,” she said of their coaching relationship. “He was there when I first started the sport, and he made it fun. If it wasn’t for him, I don’t know if I’d still be in the sport. He gave me room to grow all the time. He’s always encouraged me to dream, but it had to be me that wanted it. He taught me to absolutely love it.
“I don’t think anybody knows me better than him. He’s pushed me to do things that are not in my comfort zone – told me to try to go to college and that’s probably the best decision I made. I learned how to race, how to put myself in positions like this. I learned how to win. To share this with Dad is just so special. He deserves so much credit. I truly think he’s the best coach in the world.”
In return, he said her success was the result of 10 years of effort.
“She does every one percenter, she misses nothing in training, she covers every base, and I think it was just her time,” he said. “She was strong, she’s in a really good mental space, she had that great race in Paris and all of a sudden you go from an outside chance for a medal to a medal, and your mindset shifts, and I just saw this massive shift in her.”
This is the seventh athletics medal won by the Australian team in Paris, making this the most successful athletics team to compete at an Olympics off-shore.
Australia went into the final session in the athletics stadium with two strong medal chances, but the javelin final unravelled for world championships medallist Mackenzie Little, who arrived in Paris with the second biggest throw of the year (66.27m). But she failed to find her rhythm in the Olympic final and was eliminated after three throws, her best of 60.32m leaving her in 12th place.
The world champion Haruka Kitaguchi of Japan clinched victory with her first throw (65.80m), a distance that the Australian has beaten this year and that will be a bitter pill for her to swallow.
“I was confident and I’ve been able to perform in majors, but it doesn’t go your way all the time,” Little said. “I’m healthy and really happy and things are going really well, so it’s hard to say [what went wrong].”
The remarkable 42-year-old Kathryn Mitchell was Australia’s best performer in the javelin, finishing seventh with a best throw of 62.63m, in her third consecutive Olympic final.
