Williams-Mills seeking a golden exit in Rio

Novlene Williams-Mills hopes to end her Olympic career with a medal.

The 34-year-old has represented Jamaica at the previous three editions of the Games, winning three bronze medals, all in the 4x400m relay.

“This is my final chance at the Olympics, so walking away with a medal will be great,” said the 2007 World 400m bronze medallist.

“To represent Jamaica four times at an Olympic Games, I’m being blessed beyond what I can think of,” she added while noting the past four years have been challenging for her.

“Every year, just coming back, I’m always so grateful, I’m so thankful because I got another chance of doing what I love to do,” added the breast cancer survivor.

At the 2015 World Championships, she anchored Jamaica to an impressive 4x400m victory ahead of USA.

However, this time around, Williams-Mills, who has a personal best of 49.63 in the event, said:

“I’m not going to lie, it’s going to be real hard (to beat the US).

Looking at the USA team they have some great ladies. When you look at their top six, they have been running 49s, 50-point, so for us it’s about coming together as a team, just go out there and run with our hearts out, as we did last year,” she explained of the possibility to beat the Americans.

The former Ferncourt High student finished fourth at the Jamaica Trials, and will for the first time in many years, go into a Championship to run the relays only.

She said she is “still hurt” by her fourth place finish at the Jamaica Championships in June-July.

“I think that’s the longest I haven’t run the open 400m at a Championships, but we have three great ladies representing us”
“At the end of the day I will be there for the relays and hope to help my teammates get that gold medal again.”

Williams-Mills was speaking to Trackalerts.com after her 51.29 run at the TrackTown Classic in Edmonton, Canada on July 15.

American Courtney Okolo, in 50.47, won the event ahead of compatriot, Francena McCorory, 51.83, while Williams-Mills ran 51.95 for third place.

“I just feel the last part of the race I went to sleep and didn’t do any work as I was suppose to do, so I just going to have to figure out what’s going on with that,” she said of the run.