Olympic gold high-jumper Ruth Beitia, 38, retires

Ruth, 38, from Cantabria, took home the gold at Rio 2016 and has loaned her medal to Santander's Sports Museum.

She went public about her giving up her profession during the presentation.

Already, after her success in Rio de Janeiro last year, Ruth said it would probably be her last Olympic games as she could not imagine competing at Tokyo 2020 at the age of 41, when she would be considered very 'elderly' for high-jumping.

And after scooping up 15 international medals, winning two Diamond Leagues and netting 29 national titles in 28 years – having started out in top-level competition at the age of just 10 – she has very little left to achieve.

Ruth's fans were starting to suspect she may reach a decision to retire or, at least, drop out of the game for a while, after she was seen breaking down in tears of disappointment during the World Athletics Championships in London this summer.

She had come last, but did not go home from the UK empty-handed – her comforting of a fellow competitor who also crashed out did not go unnoticed, and Ruth was given a Sportsmanship Award.

The star – who always takes a stash of Cantabria's traditional cakes, known as sobaos and corbatas, with her when she competes abroad – had long declared that if ever she stopped being able to reach the finals of a competition, she would give up.

Ruth did in fact reach the finals at the World Athletics Championships, even though she came bottom in this last round.

Some fans are not sure she is serious about giving up now, given that Ruth 'retired' once before – after London 2012, aged 33.

She had come fourth and taken home an Olympic diploma rather than a medal, but in the end decided to give it one last shot – a decision that turned out to be the correct one, since her final games saw her scoop up the top prize and become the first Spanish woman ever to do so in athletics.

And in fact, the five years since the London Olympics have proven to be the zenith of Ruth's career – in that time, she has snaffled three consecutive European Championship titles, in Helsinki in 2012 and then Zürich and Amsterdam, as well as the Rio gold, plus a bronze at the World Athletics Championships in Moscow in 2013.

Also in that time, she has matched her national record of 2.02 metres (6'7”) which she set in San Sebastián at the 2007 Spanish National Championships and which remains unbeaten in the country.

Ruth has won six European Championship medals in the indoor category – a gold, fours silvers and a bronze, with her latest being a silver in Belgrade this year – plus four World Championship indoor medals, two bronzes and two silvers, and won the Mediterranean Games in Almería in 2005.

Her track record is as yet unbeaten by any Spaniard in athletics.