Jane Saville

Saville's career contains the event's most famous disqualification. Leading the 20km at the Sydney 2000 Olympics in front of a home crowd, she was shown the final red card just before entering the stadium, with gold seemingly in reach. Rather than fade, she came back to win Commonwealth gold in 2002 and Olympic bronze in Athens in 2004. Her story shows exactly why technique under fatigue matters as much as fitness in this event.