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Keely Hodgkinson is, without a doubt, one of the biggest stars of Team GB at this year's Paris Olympics. After a series of silver medals throughout her career, the breathtakingly fast 800m runner from Manchester finally took home gold this year.
Here's a little more about the athlete's fascinating journey so far.
From Simone Biles to Nada Hafez.
Keely Hodgkinson grew up near Manchester
Hodgkinson was born in 2002 and grew up in Atherton, a small town near Manchester.
In high school, she actually became friends with another Mancunian athlete: Manchester United's Ella Toone.
“We are just two young girls living their dreams. Ella and I went to school together,” Hodgkinson told the Mirror, who met the footballer in high school. "She was two years older but somehow we ended up getting on really well. I was referred to as the ‘mini Ella’ so we always kept in touch."
The pair remain friends and Hodgkinson hopes that one day, she'll be just as recognised in Manchester as her friend is.
“There’s a big picture of [Ella's] face at Old Trafford,” Hodgkinson told The Guardian. “It’s massive! I sent it to her the other day. It’s amazing to watch in one year how much women’s football has come on." She added that she'd love to see her own face plastered up around the city. "That would be nice,” she said. “That would be getting the same recognition, wouldn’t it?”
Keely Hodgkinson discovered running by chance
While some athletes grow up on the track, Hodgkinson didn't discover her love of running until she was a little older. In fact, she was more concerned with swimming.
“I competed for my school in swimming and I thought I was really good,” she told The Guardian in 2021. “But me and my dad would always have the same argument. He’d tell me that I was a better runner, and I’d get really offended and be like, ‘Oh so you think I’m a bad swimmer,’ even though he wasn’t even saying that. I was just stubborn. But eventually I went down to my local club and started to gravitate towards athletics.”
The rest, as they say, is history.
We came for the sports, but stayed hair, makeup, and nails.
Keely Hodgkinson is partially deaf
When Hodgkinson was 13 years old, she had a major surgery to remove a non-cancerous tumour from her brain.
“I had a mastoidectomy which is from memory a type of tumour — but non-cancerous or anything, it wasn't majorly life-threatening — that had been growing for ten years,” she said to Sky Sports.
The tumour had “crushed through her hearing bones” and had grown big enough to touch her spine. “The risk for the operation was to take it out or keep it in,” she said. "If you keep it in and let it grow, it can hit the spine and I could end up with Facial Palsy. Now that was quite scary for a 13-year-old girl to think that could happen, but the bones were already crushed anyway so they tried to save them but that turned out why I had a lot of hearing problems growing up."
Hodgkinson remains partially deaf in one ear.
Keely Hodgkinson has become a fashion It girl
Although we usually see Hodgkinson in her running gear, when she's off the track, she's something of a fashion girlie.
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“I like playing around with fashion and dressing up,” she told Vogue, “even if I’m only out until 11pm because I’ve got training the next day.” Her latest purchase? A pink Chanel bag.
Keely Hodgkinson finally took home gold at the 2024 Paris Olympics
Hodgkinson has been after an Olympic gold for years. After taking home the silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics at just 19 years old. In the next three years, she placed second in three more major competitions. And so, she arrived in Paris with one goal: gold. And that's exactly what she did, winning the 800m race with a time of 1:56.72.
"I have really grown over the last couple of years and this year was the year where you could really tell that I had tried to make that step up," Hodgkinson said to the BBC after winning the race. "The future is bright. I'm super happy to bring it home for everyone. It's not just me, it's a whole team effort and they know who they are. This is our gold medal."
