London 2012 Olympics: Sharp left to rue tactics as she comes up short in 800m

Running in the first semi-final of the 800 metres, the 21-year-old Scot went through to the bell too slowly, and on the second lap failed to get back in touch with the leaders.

She had hoped to beat her personal best of 2min 00.52sec, and was confident she was in the form to do so. Instead, she trailed in seventh of eight runners in 2:01.78, in a race from which only the top two qualified by right for tomorrow’s final. She was in tears afterwards, distraught by her inability, for once, to rise to the occasion.

“I just ran rubbish in the first lap and found myself in a really bad position, which is not how I’ve run all season,” she said. “But it just didn’t happen on the first lap.

“It was really difficult down the back straight with five girls wide across the front and I would have had to go into lane four to get through and I just ran out of ground in the home stretch. At the break I was at the front and I didn’t want to be at the front, obviously, in that field. And I don’t know whether I slowed down or they picked up, but it was way slower than it should have been.

“I thought they would have gone through in 57 and I think it was 59. It was just rubbish.”

In the Olympic trials, and again in the European Championships in Helsinki, Sharp finished strongly, winning the former race and coming away with a silver medal from the latter. But last night she was simply too far off the pace, against a very high-quality field which included defending champion Pamela Jelimo of Kenya, and was unable to get close to the leaders.

“I gave it my all down the home straight once I had some space to get running,” Sharp added. “But the first lap – I’ll play that first lap over in my head a million times. It was going to be hard to make the final, but I just feel that I’ve got a lot more than a 2:01 in me.”

Jelimo won in 1:59.42 and will be a strong contender for a place on the podium. But she faces a fierce challenge for her title from South Africa’s Caster Semenya, who won the second semi in 1:57.67 ahead of Russia’s European champion Elena Arzhakova. Another Russian, Mariya Savinova, won the third semi in 1:58.57.

Having been selected in preference to several more experienced athletes, Sharp was always going to be under severe scrutiny here. But, while she was rightly disappointed with her run last night, there is nothing to suggest that any of her rivals would have come  closer to the final.

“Everyone said to run how I did  yesterday with so much pressure on me was a huge achievement, and I’ve coped really well with the pressure. The pressure had nothing to do with how I ran today. It just didn’t come together in the first lap.

“If someone had said at the start of the year that I’d be a silver medallist at the Europeans and an Olympic semi-finalist, I would have been so happy with that. But I know I had more in me today. Even if I’d just run in the top five I would have been happy with that.”

With some weeks of the season still to go, she aims to compete again, in search of that elusive personal best. “I’m definitely going to race a few more times, because I’m in such good shape. If I get into the right race I’ve got a huge PB in me: my training showed me.”

In the shorter term, in what remains of the Olympics she hopes to get out and see a little more of proceedings than she has so far been able to. “Literally I’ve done nothing but eat and sleep, so I might just get out and enjoy the experience. The public have been unbelievable. I’ll get out and enjoy it now and I’ll remember the cheer of the crowd forever.”