Athletics: Saville keeps feet on ground to banish nightmare of Sydney

The big bearded Dubliner who crossed the line first in the five-mile walk at the 1868 Civil Service championships in London was horrified when the chief judge informed him he had been disqualified for "lifting" – breaking contact with the ground. Abraham Stoker was so horrified, in fact, he turned his attention away from the twilight event of athletics towards the darker side of life. He became better known as Bram Stoker, author of Dracula.

Jane Saville suffered the same fate two years ago, only she received a red card just 120 metres from victory in the women's 20-kilometre walk in her home-town Olympics. "It was like a dream that turned into my worst nightmare in a couple of seconds," she reflected when she arrived in Manchester last week. She came halfway around the globe to do it, but on the roads and paths of Salford Quays yesterday the 27-year-old Sydneysider exorcised the ghost of her home-town horror.

It might have been 11,500 miles away, but the scene as Saville approached the 20km finish line, in the shadow of the Lowry Centre was positively Sydneyesque. The sun was scorching and the huge crowd that had roared the 10-strong field on their 10 laps of the course included a sizeable Antipodean contingent screaming "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie." In Sydney, in the immediate aftermath of her disqualification, Saville had been in such distress she might have changed her first name to that of Niobe Menendez, the English walker with the Spanish father who finished seventh yesterday and who was called after the grieving Greek goddess who was petrified in a permanently tearful state. Even Saville's husband, Matt, was unable to console her.

Yesterday she crossed the line smiling and made directly for her other half. They hugged and kissed as Lisa Kehler, a 35-year-old Birmingham doctor, finished 11 seconds behind her and collapsed to the ground in exhaustion after her own noble effort to win the silver medal.

"What happened back then was a nightmare," Saville said, when she was asked to compare her feelings with those of two years ago. "Today, when I got into the finishing stretch, I was thinking, 'This is so good, so good.' But I wasn't counting any chickens.

"Right up to the finish line I was watching the chief judge. When I crossed the line I was so relieved. I'm just so happy to be here. There are so many Aussies around it's unreal. It's great to be an Aussie in Manchester today." It was indeed. Saville's team-mate Nathan Deakes won the men's race in 1hr 25min 35sec ahead of another Australian, Luke Adams. It was Saville's story, though, that had the Australian media massed in force.

The philosophical manner in which she accepted her fate two years ago, after her initial tears of disappointment, won her as many admirers as Cathy Freeman gained for her golden 400m home run. She has also won respect for battling on in her sport despite suffering disqualifications in both the national and World Championship races last year.

Saville received just the one caution yesterday, two short of the three-strike dismissal that operates in race walking. "I've been working so hard on my technique in the last two years," she said.

Her only disappointment was that her sister, Natalie, finished out of the medals in fourth place. Even Jane's husband was a happy man. Matt White is a cyclist with the US Postal Team who narrowly missed the cut for the Tour de France squad – and the chance to ride down the Champs-Elysées with Lance Armstrong yesterday. "Ah, it's good to be here, mate," he said. "It's good to be here."