Over the course of one of the finest performances in recent British athletics history, Katarina Johnson-Thompson remained expressionless. She believed – just as she had somehow continued to believe through the pain of her very public previous failures – but she refused to succumb to her emotions.
The memories were too raw; the labels still too close. Choker. Bottler. Destined for failure. She could not let it happen again. Not this time. Not with the world title in her grasp.
Step by gentle step she progressed, extending her lead with magnificent run after magnificent jump after magnificent throw until her only real rival, one of the greatest heptathletes in history, tapped out.Nafi Thiam, the Olympic, world and European champion could take it no more.
Troubled by an elbow problem and safe in the knowledge that Johnson-Thompson was untouchable regardless of anything she threw at her, the Belgian donned her tracksuit and walked off midway through the penultimate event. The game was up. With one event still remaining, Johnson-Thompson had all but secured the world title.
Still she gave no hint of what she was feeling. A new target had appeared. Within months of appearing on the global stage as a wide-eyed teenager, Johnson-Thompson had been labeled “the next Jessica Ennis-Hill”. Surely it was unfair to even ask her to compete with Britain’s athletics queen.
Yet here she was within sight of Ennis-Hill’s incredible national record set when winning Olympic gold at London 2012. In what became an 800 – meter race against the clock, Johnson-Thompson went for it, keeling over exhausted after the finish line to hear her final score: 6, 981 Points.
Better than Ennis-Hill (by 26 points) and better than Denise Lewis. Having revealed earlier this year that she suffered from imposter syndrome, Johnson-Thompson had proven even herself wrong. She was world champion and she most certainly belonged.
It is not difficult to see how such deep mental scars emerged. Four years ago, she looked certain to win a first World Championships medal only to crash out when failing to register a legal mark in the long jump. Two years on it was a dreadful high jump that let her down. In between, she finished only sixth at the Olympics.
An overhaul was required and so she bade farewell to her childhood coach, her home town of Liverpool and her beloved sausage dogs, throwing herself into a new life in Montpellier, France – prepared to sacrifice everything in the quest for glory.
Slowly, her fortunes turned. A world indoor title paved the way for Commonwealth gold and a European silver behind Thiam last year, as the mistakes of her past grew more distant. She seemed – and until this performance in Doha it felt necessary only to whisper it – remarkably consistent. Even then, she never envisaged anything like this.
“The last two World Championships have been heartbreaking,” she said. “Mid-heptathlon, I’ve gone back to my hotel and cried and cried for hours when things have gone badly.
“It was after the high jump in London in 2017 and after the long jump in 2015 in Beijing. Those were the low points of my career. Rio Olympics, as well.
“I’ve had a lot of bad years. I’m just so happy that I came out in front for a change. ”
Day one had passed in a blur of near-perfection with 100 m hurdles and shot put personal bests combining with a championship best high jump and event-topping 200 m to give her a 96 – point cushion over Thiam overnight. The lead only grew.
A 6. 77 m long jump – her best ever during a heptathlon – kicked off the second day, while Thiam could go no further than 6. 40 m. If the Belgian was to somehow deny her, the major swing would have to come in the javelin, an event Johnson-Thompson has long seemed destined never to master. But on a night for fresh storylines, she wrote a new narrative, flinging it 43. 93 m with the best throw of her life.
Unlike at the Rio Olympics, where Thiam threw a personal best despite an elbow injury, this time she had to submit to her body, managing just 48. 04 m before surrendering with one attempt remaining.
But this was no story of Johnson-Thompson taking advantage of a wounded rival. By that point, she had already ground Thiam into submission. Even fully fit, the Belgian would not have won gold.
Another personal best 2min 7. (sec completed the rout in the) m, with Thiam taking silver in 6, 677 points and Austria’s Verena Preiner bronze in 6 , 560.
Ennis-Hill said: “To come back and deliver in this way with all these personal bests is incredible. You have to get to the lowest point, the breaking point.
“She got to that and she made big changes and decisions and they are the reason she has gone on to improve and become the world champion now.”
Who would have thought it? Johnson-Thompson: the woman for the big occasion.
After two British gold medals in two days, Laura Muir has faint hopes of completing the hat-trick in Saturday’s 1500 m final. Muir, who had not raced for 10 weeks prior to these World Championships after tearing her calf, dictated proceedings from the front of her semi-final to ensure she crossed the line in third.
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