heartbreaking
There was Olympic heartbreak for Team GB sprinter Adam Gemili on Tuesday morning as he pulled up in his 200m heat with a hamstring injury.
Gemili tore his hamstring on the warm-up track, but bravely tried to compete at Tokyo 2020.
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He only got a few metres down the track before then hobbling the rest of the distance.
The Team GB star took nearly two minutes to complete the race, but he was determined to get to that finish line.
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A tearful Gemili told the BBC: "It's just the worst feeling in the world.
"Literally my last block start before I went into the call room and I just felt my hamstring go.
"I'm in so much pain but I said just strap it up and let me go out there and at least try. You have to try."
Gemili was the second Team GB sprinter to suffer a hamstring injury as Dina Asher-Smith's Olympics dream was also shattered before it got going.
Former British sprinter Iwan Thomas, who won a silver at Atlanta 1996 in the 4x400m relay, reacted to the news on talkSPORT today.
He said on the White and Jordan show: “They must be devastated. I used to ask my coach ‘why do I get injured all the time?’
“His analogy to me was ‘you can have an old battered Y-reg Fiesta, you never check the oil, put petrol in it and it never lets you down. Get a £200,000 supercar and it’s forever breaking’.
“Athletes are like that. They are so finely tuned, it’s a small margin between being at the peak of your fitness and your body letting you down.
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“I know for myself I tore my hamstring a lot and once I did it two or three times, it seemed to happen quite frequently.
“With the humidity out there, the intensity of the training, maybe a bit of dehydration, whatever it might be, for someone like Adam to have this happen so close to racing is heartbreaking.
“For Dina, it was really close whether she would even run. I know she saw a German doctor who is the best when it comes to hamstring injuries.
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“You have to get the right balance of wrapping yourself up in cotton wool because you are so close to the Olympic Games, but you can’t miss out on training because your opponents are going to get that edge.
“I used to think so close to Championships ‘I don’t want to do anything’, but you do have to continue your training.”