Jessica Ennis, the darling of British athletics and poster girl for the London Games, lived up to the sky-high expectations of a demanding public to claim gold in the women's heptathlon on Saturday.
Three personal bests in the seven disciplines that make up the gruelling two-day event helped Ennis to a winning total of 6,955 points in a dominant display that thrilled the sell-out 80,000 crowd at the Olympic Stadium.
Germany's Lilli Schwarzkopf, initially disqualified in the 800m but reinstated on appeal, claimed silver with 6,649 points, with Russian world champion Tatyana Chernova taking bronze (6,628)
Ukraine's Lyudmyla Yosypenko was the unlucky athlete to be bumped off the podium despite notching up a personal best of 6,618.
It was an especially sweet triumph for Ennis because she missed out on the Beijing Olympics through injury.
"I am so shocked I can't believe it," a tearful Ennis said. "After the javelin I knew I was on for a good score and that medal but I couldn't even let myself believe it until I crossed the finish line.
"After Beijing everyone just said 'we're going for another four years, make sure you get there in one piece to finish what we started' and now I've done that I'm so thankful that everyone's helped me all this way.
"It's been a really stressful year and there's been a lot of pressure put on me and everyone thought I was going to win that medal from day one. It's been ups and downs.
"I just tried to stay focused on what I knew I could do and the crowd helped me and I've done it, I can't believe I've done it!"
Ennis built her lead on Friday's first day of action, setting personal bests in the 100m hurdles (12.54sec) and 200m (22.83sec) for 4,158 points, an overnight advantage of 184 points over Lithuanian Austra Skujyte.
The 26-year-old Sheffield-born former world champion got her second day off to a great start with a long jump of 6.48m for a total of 5,159.
That increased her lead over Skujyte to 258pts, with Chernova moving into third overall (4,869) with a leading 6.54m in the long jump.
In front of roars and applause from a vociferous crowd, Ennis then managed a third personal best of 47.49m in her weakest event, the javelin.
Skujyte threw 51.13m to cut Ennis' lead to 188pts, but the Lithuanian's best time in the 800m was seven seconds slower than Ennis, meaning the Briton was realistically sitting pretty with just two laps of the track to complete to tie up gold.
As she was introduced in lane four, a visibly nervous Ennis raised her arms to a deafening roar, flashes of cameras and waving Union Jacks.
When the gun went off, Ennis started confidently and went to the front with Skujyte trailing last of the nine-strong heat.
Ennis was overtaken with 250m to go, but kicked past Chernova and Schwarzkopf to produce a fantastic home stretch sprint that could not have been better scripted, crossing the line in 2:08.65.
"I just had to give it everything at the end," Ennis said.
"I just thought I'm only going to have one moment to do this in front of a home crowd like this in London. I just wanted to make sure that I gave a good show and brought it home and did not leave anything on the track."
Ennis then paraded around the stadium draped in her own Union Jack on which was written "Jessica Ennis - Olympic champion".
Defending Olympic champion Natallia Dobrynska of Ukraine, who won the world indoor pentathlon title in a world record total this year just days before her husband and coach died, had earlier seen her medal hopes vanish.
In 10th position on 3,835pts overnight, Dobrynska had a nightmare in the long jump, with two no jumps on her first two of three efforts.
She then botched her run-up for her third effort, recording only 3.70m to leave her languishing in 33rd, an unsurmountable 1,082 points off Ennis. The Ukrainian withdrew before the javelin.
Polish hope Karolina Tyminska also failed to register a mark in the long jump, and the fourth-placed finisher in the Daegu worlds was forced out.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ennis-closes-heptathlon-gold-145933172--oly.html
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