Pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva had nearly abandoned all hope of ending her stellar career with a third Olympic gold in Rio, saying she would hang up her spikes at a far less glamourous event on the banks of the Volga.
But the International Olympic Committee's announcement on Tuesday that Russian athletes who are individually screened by world athletics governing body, the IAAF, might be allowed to compete in Rio under Russia's flag has revived the two-time Olympic champion's Rio dreams.
"Today I have to admit that deep down there is hope," Isinbayeva told reporters after winning the Russian championship in Cheboksary with a 4.90-metre vault. "It hasn't died completely."
The crowd-pleasing athlete, 34, asked for the bar to be raised to 5.07m to the rhythmic clapping of an extatic crowd, in an attempt to beat the 5.06m world record she set in 2009.
Isinbayeva missed but celebrated her national championship victory with a backflip on the landing area in what was her first official competition since 2013 due to giving birth to a daughter in 2014.
Russia's pole vault tsarina had said that Tuesday's national championship final in Cheboksary -- a Volga port city some 650 kilometres east of Moscow -- would be the last track and field meet of her professional career if she could not compete in Rio.
IAAF's decision last week to uphold Russia's suspension over evidence of state-sponsored doping in athletics had cast heavy doubt about whether Isinbayeva -- the first woman to clear the 5-metre bar -- would be taking part in her fifth and final Olympics in Rio.
The IAAF left the door ajar for a few clean Russian athletes to compete in Rio as neutrals -- a prospect Isinbayeva rejected, saying she would only compete under her country's flag.
But the IOC's announcement might now give Isinbayeva a loophole to end her career on the world stage after all.
"Now it means that the end of my career, I hope, will be in Rio," she said. "I was desperate yesterday, but I'm very optimistic today.
