Nightmare for Ohuruogu

Former champion Christine Ohuruogu's miserable season went from bad to worse on Saturday as she was disqualified from the World Championships for a false start.

Ohuruogu was competing in heat three of the first round of the women's 400metres, an event she won four years ago in Osaka before adding the Olympic title in 2008.

But the Londoner's championships lasted just a fraction of a second as she sprang from her blocks before the gun, immediately putting her hands to her face in disbelief. Ohuruogu was shown a red card by a race official and led off the track.

Ohuruogu admitted last week she had come close to not travelling to Daegu in favour of concentrating on a home Olympics in 2012, especially after finishing last at Crystal Palace in a race she described as "really appalling."

The 27-year-old has been hampered by injuries and has not broken 50 seconds since the Beijing Olympic final. Her season's best of 51.49 seconds left her outside the top 30 in the world rankings.

"Many times I thought I can't be bothered to do this any more," she said from the British team's training camp in Ulsan. "Scrap the season and just worry about next year.

"But it was always my focus to make the championships. However I had to make it, I wanted to be there."

Ohuruogu, who was consoled by team-mate Lee McConnell - who advanced to the semi-finals along with Nicola Sanders - said afterwards: "I knew it was me straight away. I can't believe it. I just wanted to get a good start as I knew it was going to be a fast round.

"Of all the people it could have happened to, it had to be me. A false start in a 400...It's very ironic.

"I worked really hard to turn the last three weeks around. Right now I'm just kind of upset for my coach (Lloyd Cowan), who worked really hard to get me in shape. It's been a hard year for both of us but he worked really hard to keep me motivated."