Jessica Ennis joined Paula Radcliffe on the Olympic treatment table last night after aggravating an ankle injury in the biggest heptathlon before Beijing.
Ennis (pictured below), who was fourth at last year's World Championships in Osaka, ended the opening day of the HypoMeeting in Gotzis, Austria, in second place, only 36 points behind Anna Bogdanova, Russia's world indoor pentathlon bronze medallist.
But Ennis needed treatment on her right foot during the high jump after the niggle she suffered last week flared up again.
Ennis said: "I have withdrawn as a precaution.
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I am gutted. My ankle is sore and it is not the best scenario so close to the Olympics.
"I don't regret coming here, but I would not want this injury to have developed. If this was the Olympics, I would have soldiered on." Ennis will now have a scan on her ankle while Radcliffe, the marathon world record-holder, is already a major doubt for Beijing and Ennis's heptathlon team-mate Kelly Sotherton was not even in Austria after a kidney illness.
Meanwhile, Dwain Chambers needs to clock 10.85sec in the 100m in Kalamata, Greece, on Wednesday, if he is to book his place at the Olympic trials next month. However, Chambers would still have to win an appeal to overturn his lifetime Olympic ban following his positive drugs test..
