The 37-year-old from Kendal claimed she could only crawl across her house on a bad day and could barely make a meal because of her problems with mobility but a court was shown footage of the mother-of-four throwing an opponent to the floor during a judo bout.

Farrington is one of the country's leading competitors in visually impaired judokas having finished fifth at the World Championships in Turkey last year and second in the German Open while in 2009 but her London 2012 dream looks over after surveillance images also showed her out walking and shopping with her family as well as going running.

While the court heard she is genuinely disabled, it was told that Farrington had made false claims totalling almost £8,000 ($13,000) by overstating the difficulties she faced in day-to-day life.

Neil Bisarya, prosecuting for the Department of Work and Pensions at Lancaster Magistrates' Court said she had failed to notify them when her mobility improved.

"She said she could not walk more than 20 yards, limping, and that on a bad day she had to crawl around the house," he said.

Farrington had competed successfully in judo in earlier life, but a car crash had severely damaged her eyesight, the court heard.

Her spine, hips and legs were all broken but she continued taking part in the sport on doctors' advice.

In 2005 she had made a claim for Disability Living Allowance, saying she had epilepsy, arthritis, depression and visual impairment.

But fraud investigators received reports that she was able to get around unaided and carried out video surveillance on her and her family in June last year.

She was filmed walking with her husband and children for more than three miles, shopping and going to a pub in her home town of Heysham, Lancashire.

After being arrested she admitted that her mobility problems had reduced.

Farrington, who is no longer a member of the British Judo visually impaired squad, pleaded guilty to one count of failing to notify of a change of circumstances affecting benefit and was subsequently sentenced to a 12-month community order.

"She is no longer one of our team," said a spokesman for British Judo.

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