Another chance to dance for famous jiggling hurdler Michelle Jenneke as she prepares for 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games
AUSTRALIA’S famous dancing hurdler Michelle Jenneke is getting the jump on the hype and the haters ahead of April’s Commonwealth Games.
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IT hit Michelle Jenneke for six. Australian track and field head coach Craig Hilliard didn’t mince words over the hurdler’s poor showing at the Rio Olympic Games in 2016, saying she arrived out of shape.
And when Jenneke alluded that athletics wasn’t her main priority after she failed to make it beyond the heats of the 100m event at her first Olympics, Hilliard questioned her worthiness for Athletics Australia funding.
“It’s simple. If you are going to be half-baked at doing something, why are we investing in you? I can’t justify that,” Hilliard said.
Jenneke admits: “Yeah, I was a little blindsided by it. It was interesting at the time, especially since he hadn’t made any of these comments directly to me. But it’s something that happens in the sport. You’ve got to deal with the situation. Obviously I talked to him and voiced my concerns, and we move on.”
The Olympics were in August 2016. Two months later, the Sydneysider dubbed “Jiggling Jenneke” was cut off financially by the nation’s peak athletics body. She has not received a cent from it since.
But eight weeks out from the Commonwealth Games on Queensland’s Gold Coast, the 24-year-old is upbeat and self-assured. She’s in heavy training mode ahead of selection trials next week.
“I’m feeling confident … it’s looking really promising,” Jenneke says. “My coach is really happy. The goal is to run fastest at the Comm Games, but obviously I’ve got to run fast first at nationals to get there. But all signs are looking good.”
With all eyes on Jenneke on home soil, she’s throwing off any pressure to redeem herself from Rio. And while she’s changed her coach and reduced travel since then, Jenneke says she “won’t be approaching Comm Games any differently to any other major international comp I’ve been to”.
She is looking forward to the roar of home-ground support to spur her on.
“The thought that I might get to compete in front of a home crowd has been something that’s really motivated me to definitely want to be on that start line and compete well,” she says.
“I’ve never competed for Australia on home soil. When you go to other countries and see the host nation cheer their athletes out on the track and how much they really get behind them, it’d be absolutely amazing to be an Australian and have the whole crowd
cheering for you. Australians love their sport.”
That love includes Sally Pearson — Jenneke’s main rival who has overcome a spate of injuries and is one of the fastest 100m hurdlers in history, having won Olympic gold in London in 2012.
How driven is Jenneke to be the green and gold’s top hurdler?
“Becoming No. 1 is a pretty tough ask,” she laments. “Going up against Sally, she’s an incredible athlete. She’s the current world champion.
“But honestly, for me, all I want to do is run as fast as I possibly can. I’m not really thinking about trying to beat Sally, (though) I really love racing against her and I think when I do, it helps push me to faster times.
“People say, ‘It kinda sucks that you’re in the same race as her’, but I always say, ‘No, it’s incredible’. It’s helped me be a better athlete.”
While Jenneke might not be a household name for athletics alone, mention her in the context of her pre-race dance and being an internet sensation, and recognition is likely to be instant.
She’s been compared by more than one commentator to Anna Kournikova, the Russian tennis player who shot to fame for her model looks rather than her on-court success, earning more from sponsors than prizemoney.
On the back of her energetic pre-race bouncing, Jenneke has landed high-profile sponsorship deals and modelling jobs, including appearing in Sports Illustrated magazine. These days, Puma supplies her sportswear and she’s just signed with Blistex lip balm to be its Commonwealth Games brand ambassador.
Clive Addison, CEO of Key Pharmaceuticals, which distributes Blistex, calls Jenneke an influential young Australian. The fact she genuinely uses the product is a bonus.
“Michelle’s an inspirational role model to so many, balancing her life between training as an Olympic athlete and a mechatronic engineering student,” Addison says.
It’s not the first time Jenneke has gone into an international competition with a sponsorship deal under her belt.
As part of Coca-Cola’s global Rio Olympics campaign, she was plastered on massive billboards around the streets of Brazil and appeared in a TV commercial — secretly filmed in Barcelona — performing her hip-wiggling dance. The lucrative deal made her the most visible member of the 60-strong Aussie athletics team in Rio.
When her Olympic results failed to impress, Hilliard said, “It would be easy to suggest that (outside distraction) was possibly a scenario.”
But Jenneke has zero regrets about doing the campaign for the drinks giant.
“It was a really good experience for me,” she says. “I got a lot of media exposure out of it, which was really good.
“And I think I only copped criticism because I didn’t compete as well in Rio as I would’ve liked and as other people would have liked. There were circumstances out of my control.”
Jennke attributes travel and sustaining an injury on a “fast and hard track” at a pre-Olympics training camp in Florida for her lacklustre results.
“You try and make your body as durable as it can be but we’re not superhuman,” she says. “It happens and I did what I could. Things don’t always go to plan.”
She looks back on the furore as a learning experience, though still isn’t sure why people are so keen to stick the boots in.
“I’m not sure what it is about me,” she says. “It was tough at the time … but in the end it doesn’t have that much of an impact.
“My family and those around me know what the situation was and know what sort of person I am.”
As for her famous dance, Jenneke maintains she does it purely to psych herself up for a race, not draw attention to herself.
“I’ve done it for years before anyone knew or cared who I was,” she says.
It started in 2009 — when she was 16 — and quickly became something of a good-luck charm.
“I was lining up for a race and I was really flat and wasn’t feeling up to it but just thought, ‘It doesn’t really matter, I’m just going to go and have a good time’,” she says.
“They started playing music on the track and I just started doing this little jig before I ran … I actually did really well, and started doing (the dance) a bit more. I found it really helped me get into good mental shape before a race so I kept going with it.”
After footage of her dancing at the 2012 world junior championships in Barcelona went viral, Jenneke became an internet hit. YouTube clips have attracted millions of views and she was featured on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in the US.
Her subsequent fame has also led to her turning down requests to appear on Channel 10’s jungle reality show I’m a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here! and stave off unwanted attention, like being asked to do her dance by strangers in the street or in cafes, or being the target of breast enhancement rumours.
“That was probably the weirdest thing I’ve read about myself. No, not true. I’m not sure when people think I had time to get a boob job.”
So, does she mind being more well-known for dancing than hurdling?
“It is what it is,” she says. “In athletics, it’s hard to make a name for yourself so having that exposure’s been really good. I’ve been fortunate.
“When the video first came out, I was still a junior athlete, so it makes sense that no one really knew about my athletic achievements.
“As the years have gone on, I’ve made more international teams and run a bit faster so I feel there’s more people who do recognise my athletic achievements as well.”
Jenneke has another lesser-known pre-race ritual ripe for sponsorship. Before a big meet, she’ll satisfy her sweet tooth with a Nutella sandwich.
“I have a theory that if I’m happy and I feel good, I’ll run well,” she says. “I’m generally pretty good with my diet and very strict in the lead-up to competitions, but Nutella’s a favourite of mine.
“I won’t have it for months so I always pack myself a Nutella sandwich when I go out to warm up and right before I’ll have it as a bit of an energy burst.”
JENNEKE grew up in Dural in Sydney’s Hills district. She left the family home — her mum, Nicky, is also her manager — only several months ago to move out with childhood friend and fellow athlete Jenny Blundell, a 1500m runner, to be closer to training at Sydney Olympic Park. She and older sister Catherine were active kids, trying their hand at most sports as well as dancing.
Jenneke was nine when she took up Little Athletics. She was hooked on hurdling despite, as she puts it, being short and not particularly good.
“I didn’t grow until I was 15 or so, so I was always shortest at the start line, but I always loved it,” she says. “It’s more challenging than just straight sprinting.”
Away from the track, Jenneke relaxes by hanging out with friends at the beach or playing cards. She’s a massive Uno fan.
As for her relationship status, she declines to comment.
But most downtime is spent studying. She’s into her sixth year of a part-time mechatronics degree — a combination of mechanical and electric engineering — at the University of Sydney.
With 18 months of study left, including a thesis and practical work, she’s confident she will find an area of speciality.
“I love the course. It can be challenging managing studies with athletics but at the moment I’m doing all right,” she says. “It’s nice having something else to think about other than training.
“I don’t think I’ll look at getting a job in the engineering industry until at least after the next Olympic Games (in Japan in 2020).
“You can’t run forever. I’ll need to get a job at some point. But I’ve got plenty of time to work out what I want to be doing.”
THE 2018 GOLD COAST COMMONWEALTH GAMES ARE ON APRIL 4-15. THE athletics TEAM SELECTION TRIALS ARE ON FEBRUARY 15-18 AT CARRARA STADIUM, GOLD COAST. gc2018.com
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