LONDON – Nothing like a little early drama to get the heart pounding.
Dylan Armstrong of Kamloops flirted with failing to qualify for the final of the London Olympics shot put competition Friday morning — throwing well below the standard on his first attempt, and fouling on his second — but steadied the nerves in time to save himself with a final toss of 20.49 metres.
That qualified him No. 7 in the 12-man field for tonight’s final.
“Hard part’s over. It’s always the hard part, qualification — the nerves are high and pressure’s on,” said the 6-4, 310-pound Commonwealth and Pan-American Games champion, last year’s world silver medalist.
“The first one I was trying to be easy, and it was a little bit too easy. Didn’t nail it hard enough, and then the second one slipped — the chalk’s a little bit different; they don’t let us bring our own chalk — and it just . . . slipped. And I nailed the last one.”
He hadn’t planned for it to come down to one throw to make or break four years’ hard labour since his fourth-place finish at the Beijing Olympics.
“You know, this is what happened to me in 2009, the Berlin championship where I didn’t qualify because I just got too excited, so it can happen. But I think I’m ready,” he said.
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Shot putters normally don’t do their qualifying in front of 75,000 people.
“I knew I had it in me, I’ve put in the work, but it’s a whole different atmosphere out there,” he said. “You try to prepare as much as you can to be in a situation like this, but nothing compares to this. And it’s the morning. You’re up early, so it’s hard to get fired up because it’s a long process. You look at everyone, they’re throwing not even close to what they should be throwing. Across the board, it’s way below, and that’s quite normal. It’s the pressure cooker. So it’s kind of a relief to make the final.”
American Reese Hoffa led all qualifiers with a throw of 21.36 metres, while David Storl of Germany and Tomasz Majewski of Poland also threw over 21 metres.
Armstrong said he couldn’t begin to guess how far he will have to throw to earn a medal tonight.
“You look at the top 10 guys in the world and it’s like everyone of them has a medal from a worlds or Olympics, so any one in that final could win,” he said. “I just have to go for broke tonight.”
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