It was a dreadful sight for what may have been Sonia O'Sullivan's swan song in athletics at the highest level. The opening lap was a pedestrian 80-seconds with Sonia O'Sullivan near the front of the swarming pack. The two Chinese runners (Yingjie Sun and Huina Xing) injected a bit of pace with Sonia appearing to move backwards straightaway.

The remainder of the race was agonisingly painful to watch from an Irish perspective. Ian O'Riordan, covering the race for RTÉ, described the race, "Sonia's fond farewell turns into a nightmare." Greg Allen summarised the sight saying, "This must certainly be the nadir of her career." O'Sullivan from Cobh, Co Cork, did get a standing ovation as she recognised the Irish contingent with a suffering smile as she battled on to complete the final lap.

O'Sullivan placed 15th with a time of 16.20.90. Ethiopian Meseret Defar won the event in 14.45.65 with Kenyan Isabella Ochichi from Kenya mining the silver medal (14.48.19) and Kenyan Tirunesh Dibaba in third spot in 14.51.83.

Afterwards, talking with RTÉ, O'Sullivan refused to confirm that this was her last Olympics. "I love training and I love competing," said O'Sullivan. "Right now is an extremely emotional time and it's not the right time to make a decision about my future." Her coach and husband, Nick Bideau, afterwards confirmed that O'Sullivan had been struggling with a stomach bug in the hours before the race. He said: "Sonia has had a bad stomach problem all day and in truth should not have run but this was the Olympic final. She was very sick after the race."

2004 Athens Olympics Athletics Results