Tenth-place finish carries weight for Holley Mangold

LONDON — It would be an understatement to say that Holley Mangold had a lot on her mind.

The 22-year-old American weightlifter arrived at her first Olympic competition on Sunday with a badly injured hand that had bothered her for weeks.

Then, during warmups, her singlet split open in back, the zipper breaking off.

“Yeah, I had a wardrobe malfunction,” she said. “I was afraid it was going to rip in the crotch or something … that’s embarrassing.”

Not the type of woman to let anything slow her down — or dull a razor wit — Mangold struggled along to a decent finish, placing 10th in the women’s 165-pound-plus division.

“It’s been rough,” she said. “I was glad I could work through the pain.”

The Ohio native has attracted a lot of media attention lately — she is, to put it lightly, a character. But, injuries notwithstanding, winning a medal was never in the cards.

Everyone knew this event would be a duel between Zhou Lulu of China and Tatiana Kashirina of Russia. Zhou prevailed by setting a world record with a combined 732.6 pounds in the snatch and clean and jerk.

Kashirina finished 2.2 pounds behind for silver and Hripsime Khurshudyan of Armenia took third.

As for Mangold, she might have been the happiest 10th-place athlete in London. Just two weeks before the Games, she had been lifting in practice and heard a crunch in her hand.

“I’m going to be honest … I was crying,” she recalled. “I thought it was broken.”

The injury turned out to be a torn tendon. Already dealing with a torn labrum and damaged knees, she spent a lot of time in rehabilitation, receiving cortisone shots.

The night before Sunday’s competition, Mangold wondered if she could lift anything.

“Not a lot of sleep,” she said. “A lot of stress.”

Weightlifting is more than a sport to her. It is a way of showing the world that a big woman — as in 5 feet 8 and 346 pounds — can be athletic and feminine.

“I don’t know that this singlet makes me look good,” she conceded, but added: “Nobody looks good in a singlet, not even a tiny girl.”

It helped that a large family contingent showed up at the ExCeL Centre to cheer. That included older brother Nick, a New York Jets lineman who was supposed to be in training camp.

Watching the first few days of the Olympics on television, he realized Holley was involved in something big. At the last moment, Jets Coach Rex Ryan and his fellow linemen urged him to fly to London.

“I found out through Twitter,” Holley quipped. “He never picks up a phone.”

Nick said he was impressed — his little sister turned out to be pretty tough on Sunday. When it was over, she was also pretty relieved and happy.

“Even though I didn’t do what I wanted to do,” she said, “it’s still the Olympics.”

david.wharton@latimes.com

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