Just 11 months after shoulder surgery Mickle waited almost until flight staff were calling for the last passengers to board before throwing a javelin a distance she felt would mean she had a chance of doing something in Rio.

The 2013 world silver medallist hit 60m in training just two weeks ago and was satisfied that if she could do that then, with another fortnight of training and work, she might yet be able to achieve at the Olympics.

When she competes in the Olympic Stadium it will be her first throw in competition in almost a year.

"It's kind of funny that this is going to be my season-opener," Mickle said. Fortunately her season openers in recent years have produced some of her better throws.

"I left it to death's door pretty much to see how the shoulder would respond and it has responded really well hence we jumped on the plane and we're here.

"I wanted to throw 60 and know I could throw 60 before I came over and that was two weeks ago."

Sixty metres will not win her a medal but she believes if she could throw that weeks before the Olympics then bigger throws await.

"Literally I don't know what is in me. I know now I can throw a 60 metres and that was a couple of weeks ago and things are changing rapidly once I got here," she said.

"Who knows? Your guess is as good as mine but it is pretty exciting from the fact that anything is possible.

"I'm actually just rapt because there was no way I was going to come over and not think I was going to make, firstly the final and then actually be right up there with the girls. I'm not here to make up numbers.

"So for me to be here means I do think I am in good shape but I haven't tested it.

It's just going to be one of those, if it happens it happens if not well, look, I've given it a red-hot crack."

Mickle also had a red-hot crack and threw caution to the wind with her javelin in Beijing at the World Championships last year.

Mickle was the silver medallist from the previous championships two years earlier in Moscow so her desire to compete was understandable but it undoubtedly worsened her injury and resulted in surgery.

She defends that decision to compete now saying it hastened the surgery and meant she was able to get fit for Rio. Had she not competed and injured it more in Beijing, the same thing would have happened in the domestic season and certainly cost her the Olympics.

"I'm proud of what I did back then … Beijing was actually a blessing, it made me realise 100 per cent that this surgery had to happen, I got it done, gave me a 12-month rehab program and I had 11 months so I have knuckled down and done everything humanly possible to get myself to where I am.

"I have zero regrets."

Mickle spent the year doing everything but throwing and making sure she was the fittest athlete out there.

"I'm in the best shape of my life, I'm the strongest I've ever been, I'm the fittest.

"It would be the icing on the cake if I could literally pull off what would be a miracle and get into the final and go from there."