Middle distance runner Olli Hoare has seven phones shoved in his face, in the interview room underneath the Stade de France. He coughs a bit, asks for water, tries to compose himself. It’s hard because he is out. Out of the 1500m repechage on Saturday, after a failure in the heats the day before.
“My Instagram has been really bad after that. It was a terrible race, and I’ve been abused on Instagram so I had to delete it,” Hoare says. He pauses. For seven seconds. Looks away, starts to choke up. “It’s not great. I probably should have deleted Instagram before I went into the Village, but I miss my friends.”
Much like boxer Harry Garside after his first round defeat five days ago, Hoare’s thoughts went first to letting others down. “I’m pretty disappointed, I hope I haven’t disappointed my country or my family though I am very disappointed in myself,” he says.
“As an athlete you put yourself in these positions and if you’re good enough to go through it’s all easy days, easy breezy. When you fuck up it’s pretty heartbreaking. And I’m going to have to really reassess where I’m at as an athlete after this.”
One journalist tries to reassure him, says he’s not a disappointment. Then asks him to elaborate. “I just don’t feel confident, I’ve ran two 3:31s [this year], won a Diamond League, I still have no confidence. I don’t know what’s going on.”
Hoare started the repechage – the cut-throat second chance saloon introduced in Paris for those who didn’t make it through the heats – out wide, but moved into the top three on the first bend, and seemed to be positioned well. He chased down pace setter Ryan Mphahlele in the final lap, but was swarmed by a fast finishing field, finishing in fifth, two places below the cut-off.
When asked what support he will seek to handle the loss, Hoare’s first choice is on the other side of the world. “If my dog was here he’d be the best support structure because he doesn’t really care,” he says. “Doesn’t even know what I do. He probably thinks I’m dead, because I haven’t been home for two months.”
The profile photo on Hoare’s now inactive Instagram account is the athlete with his three-year-old pet Angus. But the trolls still come for him. “They’re just DMs, direct messages,” Hoare says. “I had to delete some comments on a post that was actually just a post of my girlfriend, and they were kind of mean about that as well.”
The race was the final chance for Australia’s highly fancied 1500m contingent – which prevented heavily touted teenager Cameron Myers from going to Paris. The trio’s responses were mixed.
Stewart McSweyn, finishing second last in the first repechage, says it was “bitterly disappointing”. “Us three boys went in with big goals, it’s disappointing not to achieve them, Australia had a lot of confidence in us that we could do well, so I kind of let the people who had so much expectation down.”
Hoare was even more self-critical. “I haven’t slept great but my body felt good, I just didn’t have the last 100, I just don’t think I’m strong enough to make that semi-final. I’ve just got to be better, but I’ve also got to remove stuff and maybe not take too much stuff to heart on one side, but I’ve also got to be really critical about my own performance.”
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Adam Spencer, the less established runner of the three, finished just behind Hoare but was far more up-beat. “I hold myself to pretty high standards, like I want to put myself in a position to make the final, because once you make the final anything can happen,” he says. “But at the end of the day, like, as long as you run your best and prepare yourself as best you can, there’s not much more you can do.”
After meeting with media, Hoare immediately had a session with a psychologist working as a wellbeing manager. An AOC spokesperson says Hoare will be given support. “Losing is difficult – we all understand that and we are all rallying behind Olli and all the others whose dreams have not been realised in Olympic competition.”
Hoare says he knows the keyboard warriors don’t know his sacrifices, that he couldn’t walk in February. But he accepts their words still had an impact. “I just think that affected me in a way I wish it didn’t, and that’s what I’m going take to the next one, and know that if I have a bad race or if something goes wrong there could be a possibility of that happening and I have to just tell it to piss off.”
Angus will have to wait a little longer to see the 27-year-old. Hoare plans to continue running until the Diamond League finishes in September. “I’ve just got to get better, and I just need to stay healthy,” he says. “I need to race these next Diamond Leagues the best I possibly can, and prove to myself and anyone else that I am a really good 1500m runner.”