Less than 20 minutes later, they found themselves eternally linked – by circumstance, by action, by benevolence. Tom Brady and the Patriots didn’t get any sympathy, but maybe this time the players might be more willing to rally around one of their own.
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NY Mag’s headline for the story is a bit more overwrought: “Tripped-Up Olympic Runners Finish Race Together in Apparent Attempt to Make Me Weep Uncontrollably at My Desk”, while The Telegraph went with the tried and true “Olympic spirit”. “U.S. and New Zealand runners HELP each other finish race after fall during women’s 5,000m”.
D’Agostino and Hamblin had never met until that moment.
RIO DE JANEIRO Brazil (Xinhua) – They may not have achieved what they came for, but middle-distance runners Nikki Hamblin and Abbey D’Agostino are assured of their places in Olympic Games folklore. That’s when the long-distance races can be the most unsafe.
She would have been able to compete in the 5,000 finals had she been healthy enough to do so.
“This time Hamblin played the role of motivator and helper”. The accidental touch sent the Kiwi tumbling to the ground with the American then tripping over her and crashing as well while their fellow competitors carried on with the race.
D’Agostino was quicker to her feet at first. “Why am I on the ground?'” she was quoted as saying in the report.
It was then that D’Agostino, a Topsfield, Mass., native, realized she had suffered an ankle injury and would struggle to finish the race. We have to finish this.
The hand and the voice belonged to D’Agostino.
Speaking to Radio Sport’s Brenton Vannisselroy, Hamblin said she wasn’t sure how the fall occurred and who was at fault. But D’Agostino popped right up, urging Hamblin to do the same. “I was like, ‘Yup, yup, you’re right”.
She was running in her first Olympic games after almost qualifying in 2012 when she was still running at Dartmouth College (where she won seven NCAA titles).
Around the 3,200 mt. mark, Hamblin slowed down because another runner was overtaking her, to avoid colliding with her, but she tripped and fell.
D’Agostino was treated by Team USA medical.
“Not really the way I saw my Olympic Games going”.
Two female athletes have been praised for embodying “the Olympic spirit” following incredible show of sportsmanship. “And I am so glad she did”.
Both athletes attempted to start chasing after the pack that had left them.
“I went down. She went down”. This time Hamblin was there to lend a hand. It was instinct, a natural act and something that doesn’t usually earn medals or recognition.
The 19-year-old became the first women gymnast to win four gold medals since Romania’s Ecaterina Szabo did it in 1984.
This time, it was D’Agostino who was in tears.
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Sometimes the most inspirational moments don’t involve medals at all. She was exhausted, in pain and about to experience a touch of shock. It wasn’t long before Miz D’Agostino had to completely stop, which is when her knee buckled underneath her.
