Ankle injury can’t keep Liz Gleadle from booking ticket to London after winning javelin at Canadian Olympic track trials

At first she felt the click in her right ankle, then she heard a pop.

As the pain washed over her like a wave on the beach Liz Gleadle thought her dreams of throwing the javelin at the London Olympics were over.

"I actually couldn't walk,'' Gleadle said, shivering at the memory. "I was just devastated.''

The Vancouver native suffered the serious ankle injury June 19 while training in Lethbridge, Alta. After sacrificing so much over the last year she refused to quit just because fate had dealt her another bad card.

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Competing with several strips of black tape on the ankle, Gleadle won the javelin competition at the Canadian Track and Field Trials Friday evening. The 23-year-old becomes the first Canadian female javelin thrower to compete at an Olympics since 1988.

"It's unbelievable,'' said Gleadle, who clutched a Canadian and British flag in her hand. "I took this year off just so I could make London. I took time off from school, I moved cities.''

Gleadle reached the Olympic qualifying standard when she broke her own Canadian record with a throw of 61.15 metres while performing before friends and family at the Harry Jerome Track Classic in Vancouver earlier this month. She still needed to finish in the top three at the Olympic trials to punch her ticket to London.

That's why she felt frustration and anger when she hurt herself running during an indoor training session.

"It was really bad,'' said Gleadle, a tall woman with a deep laugh and self-depreciating since of humour.

"I have a really great athletic therapist. He took care of me. I was in physio every single day last week and this week. I got better fast. I was fortunate enough to be here.''

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Gleadle won the trials with a throw of 60.13 metres. It was well below her record but still about four metres better than second-place finisher Krista Woodward.

The ankle hurt in warmups but it wasn't anything Gleadle couldn't handle.

"You push throw the pain, take some Advil,'' she shrugged.

Gleadle admits she can be a walking disaster.

Earlier this year she was at practise when one the hammers being used by a male thrower snapped off its wire. The hammer bounced off the ground then hit Gleadle on the right leg.

"That hurt. A lot,'' she said.

"I am injury prone. I am accident prone. I wouldn't put it past me to trip over my own two shoe laces.''

Gleadle took some solace in the fact her last ankle injury came when she was following instructions.

"At least I wasn't doing something I wasn't supposed to do,'' she said. "That's the worst, if you go out and play basketball and sprain your ankle. Then you feel like an idiot.

"I don't feel like an idiot. It was just bad luck.''

This was a make or break year for Gleadle. She put studying for her kinesiology degree on hold and left Vancouver for Lethbridge to work with coach Larry Steinke.

"I'm 23 years old,'' she said. "It was either get your stuff together with track or it was going back to school, get a job, be a real person. You can't keep doing this. It's an expensive sport unless you have sponsorship or someone backing you.''

Gleadle credits Steinke with honing her talents.

"I trained really hard,'' she said. "I did everything I was told to do by my coach. I trust him completely and it's really paid off.

"It's nice to know I can have that trust and know what he's doing for me is best for me. I just shut my mouth, do the workouts, do what he tells me to do and everything works out.''

The Olympics will be a whole new experience for Gleadle. She knows she can either be crushed by the pressure or thrive on it.

"Maybe I will use it to my advantage,'' she said.

The one thing Gleadle is confident about is her ability.

"There is a lot more left in the tank,'' she said with a smile.

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