Jessica Ennis is new golden girl of British athletics

British athletics has a new heroine after Jessica Ennis romped to gold in the heptathlon at the World Championships in Berlin last night. Bookmakers WIlliam Hill swiftly installed her as 2/1 favourite to take the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award, eclipsing Jenson Button and Andy Murray.

The 23-year-old from Sheffield with model looks has come a long way since June last year when her career hung in the balance after she broke her foot in three places.

She had been tipped to follow in the footsteps of Denise Lewis, who won gold at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, and Kelly Sotherton, who took bronze at Athens four years later. But she was forced to watch the Beijing Olympics, in which Sotherton finished fifth, from her sofa with her foot in a protective boot as she recuperated from the triple fracture.

However the psychology graduate used her disappointment as a spur to recover from the injury and, even though she only returned to competition in May, last night she become the first British woman to win heptathlon gold at the World Championships.

Ennis is small for a heptathlete, just five foot five, but her performances on the first day were awesome and she recorded the third best points total in history - only Jackie Joyner-Kersee and Carolina Kluft had done better. And on day two she maintained her dominance to take gold by 238 points.

She led from the first event, the 100m hurdles, set a personal best in the shot put and managed a javelin five-and-a-half metres longer than she managed at her previous Worlds. She even performed well in the long jump after remodelling her action to take off on what used to be her wrong foot.

Such was the anticipation among success-starved British fans during the second day of the event that her website crashed as supporters logged on to find out more about her.

Her delight at winning was obvious. ""It's been the longest two days of my life but the best," she said. "I can't believe it. I'm the world champion, I feel like crying.

She also gave an insight into her fight to recover from her injury. "I was at such a low point last year so to come back from that and so strongly, it's amazing... I've dreamt so many times about winning medals and becoming world champion, doing a lap of honour. It's the best feeling in the world." ·