Michelle’s Magic Moves

Michelle Jenneke (AUS)GWANGJU – “I just thought it was really funny and random,” says Australian hurdler Michelle Jenneke about her pre-race warm-up video that went viral. Michelle Jenneke is an Australian hurdler. She won a silver medal for the 100 m hurdles at the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics.

But it was the video from the 2012 Junior World Championship in Barcelona, what brought her worldwide fame. “Actually, I am doing this warm-up since 2009. When I first saw the video, it had about sixty thousand views. But I thought it would die down and no one would know me by tomorrow.”

By now, the video has been watched more than 27 million times. It was featured on the American late night talk show, ‘The Tonight Show’. Thanks to this attention, Jenneke also took a part in a short comedy clip referencing her viral video. The clip named ‘Forever Alone Meets Michelle Jenneke’ was produced by The Chive website and it has reached almost 10.5 million views.

“Athletics is not that high profile and anything that gives it more of a profile is good,” Jenneke reflects the engineering student of the University of Sydney.

Right now, she has the chance to do her pre-race moves on the field of the 28^th Summer Universiade in Gwangju. After the Heat race, she ended up second behind Eva Strogies from Germany. “I think the race went really well. It was just a heat race so I ran it like that. But I am pretty happy with how it went,” says Jenneke, who is considered one of the favourites in the Women’s 100m Hurdles.

Check Michelle’s Magic Moves here!

Lucie Hrdličková (CZE), FISU Young Reporter