by Larry Eder
EME NEWS (APR 26, 2013)
Defar for Shanghai 5000 m
SHANGHAI (CHN): Three more Olympic gold medallists and one world champion have been added to the star-studded roster for the 2013 Shanghai Diamond League meeting on 18 May. Jamaican sprinter Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, British long jumper Greg Rutherford, and Ethiopian distance legend Meseret Defar have joined the entry lists for the second meeting in the IAAF’s 2013 Diamond League calendar, while world sprint hurdles champion Jason Richardson has been lined up to face Olympic champion and world record holder Aries Merritt. After Doha also Shanghai will not see Yohan Blake. “I am so sorry for Shanghai, but because of a slight injury I will not be able to participate this year,” said the Jamaican, who was third at the 2006 World Junior Championships in Beijing. “Everything happens for a reason. The last time I was in your part of the world, I came third in the world juniors.
A. Merritt confirmed for NYC
NEW YORK (USA): With the adidas Grand Prix in New York City one month away, 10 of the best track and field athletes in the world have been added to the deep international field at the IAAF Diamond League meeting on 25 May. Led by 2012 superstar Aries Merritt in the 110m Hurdles, the star-studded list includes four London 2012 Olympic Games gold medallists, three athletes ranked number one in the world for last year, and a World record holder. Among Merritt’s opponents will be USA’s David Oliver, the 2008 Olympic Games bronze medallist. Other top names from USA confirmed are Brittney Reese, Christian Cantwell (vs Ryan Whiting), Stephane Trafton Brown (against Sandra Perkovic), Morgan Uceny, Ryan Bailey. In women pole vault Brazil’s Fabriana Murer, the 2011 World champion with European indoor champion Holly Bleasdale have been added into the field with Jenn Suhr. Previously announced were Tyson Gay, David Rudisha, Veronica Campbell-Brown, Blanka Vlasic, Javier Culson, Jeremy Wariner, Bianca Knight and Michael Tinsley.
Strong sprints
PONCE (PUR): The Puertorican leg of IAAF World Challenge, the 7th Ponce Grand Prix de Atletismo announced home star Javier Culson for the 400 m hurdles on May 18. Against him Cuban Omar Cisneros and US Jeshua Anderson. Other top names include in the men 100 m Jamaican relay olympic winner Kemar Bailey-Cole, Keston Bledman of Trinidad and Wallace Spearmon from USA. Women 100 m has Kelly-Ann Baptiste from Trinidad against Murielle Ahoure of Ivory Coast and US sprinters Tianna Bartoletta and Lauryn Williams. Bahamian relay olympic winner Demetrius Pinder will compete against Angelo Taylor in the 400 m and French Ladji Doucoure and Ryan Brathwaite of Barbados, both former world champions and new Cuban star Orlando Ortega will fight at the 110 m hurdles. Men hammer will have Slovak Eurowinner Libor Charfreitag and former Olympic winner from Poland Szymon Ziolkowski. World medalist Lazaro Borges competes in the pole vault.
OTHER NEWS
LONDON (GBR): British Olympic Association (BOA) chairman Sebastian Coe has unveiled Nissan as the first post-London 2012 Tier One sponsor of Team GB and ParalympicsGB here in a deal that will see them support Britain’s top athletes at Sochi 2014 and Rio 2016. The new agreement will see Nissan involved in the “Road to Sochi and Rio” initiative as the Official Automotive Partner of the two teams while they will also provide vehicles to the BOA and British Paralympic Association (BPA) for logistical support. Informs insidethegames.
MADRID (ESP): No less than 17 000 runners will gather in the Spanish capital on Sunday to take part in the 36th Rock ‘n’ Roll Madrid Marathon. Course records 2:10:58 and 2:32:04 will be under threat. In the men’s race, there will be a crop of Kenyan representatives, including the experienced Thomson Cherogony, who has successively placed first, second and third over the last three years in Madrid. Elijah Kemboi with 2:07:51 best from Kosice 2012 is another top name. Trying to deny Kenyans the top spot there will be a powerful triumvirate of Zimbabwe’s Cuthbert Nyasango, Rwanda’s Robert Kajuga (debut) and Erhiopia’s Herpasa Negasa. The Spanish challenge will be led by Carlos Castillejo, fresh from his 27:57:92 10000m win at the national championships three weeks ago and Rafael Iglesias, who has a best of 2:10:44. The women’s race includes Morocco’s in-form Malika Asahssah, who has tackled the Half Marathon event no fewer than four times in 2013, topped by personal best of 69:13 in Rome seven weeks ago. From the IAAF.
GATESHEAD (GBR): Double olympic winner Mo Farah has confirmed he will form part of the Great Britain and Northern Ireland team at the European Athletics Team Championships in Gateshead in June. “I am delighted that Mo Farah has made himself available for the European Athletics Team Championships in Gateshead,” commented UK Athletics head coach, Peter Eriksson. The competition, which takes place over two days on June 22-23 and now combines team scores, is most likely to see 30-year-old Farah compete over 5000m or perhaps the 3000m, with the team going up against opponents from Belarus, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Norway, Poland, Russia, Spain, Ukraine and Turkey.
ISTANBUL (TUR): Turkish Athletics Federation ruled the Olympic 1500 m champion Asli Cakir Alptekin, as well as the European 100 m hurdles champion Nevin Yanit from the selection for the Mediterranean Games in June on suspicion of doping. According to the Turkish press, their names appear on a list of eight Turkish athletes tested positive by WADA, writes Hürriyet newspaper. The Agency would have revealed abnormalities in the biological passport of Alptekin, which could mean she could be banned for life.
MINNEAPOLIS (USA): Organizers of the Medtronic TC 1 Mile announced that a quartet of Olympians will headline a strong field that will take to the streets of Minneapolis on May 9. New Zealand’s Nick Willis, Kenya’s Boaz Lalang, Canada’s Nicole Sifuentes, and Australia’s Genevieve LaCaze will all race the one mile, point-to-point course on Nicolett Mall, vying for a first-place prize of 5000 USD. Formerly the host of the USA 1 Mile Road Championships, this race is now an open event with international athletes as part of the field. Informs Race Results Weekly.
ZURICH (SUI): Swiss hurdles record holder Lisa Urech is back in full training. After 2 weeks of training camp in Tenero Urech recieved from doctors ok for full training in the coming weeks. Her arthroscopic surgery from 2012 on the right hip and the subsequent rehabilitation process went without problems.
MOSCOW (RUS): High jump Beijing Olympic champion Andrey Silnov, who has just celebrated a new arrival in the family, said to Rusathletics.com he stays focused on Moscow 2013 and will leave to Sochi training camp on May 7. “I do consider myself being able to make the team for Moscow World championships. I do not like predictions. Everything I do now is for the sake of being ready for Moscow. But everything depends on the speed of my rehabilitation. Judging from my experience, sometimes I need one-two months to get ready. Sometimes – more. I can’t say yet which way it will go this season. I don’t want just make the team for world championships, I want to perform well there. That’s why I decided to undergo surgery in the first place.”
DUSHANBE (TJK): Reigning Asian Games champion in men hammer throw Dilshod Nazarov will open competition international season on May 5 in Tokyo and estimate his current shape about 80% from usual fitness. “Unfortunately I was seriously injured last summer. Doctors from London Olympic medical center found out liquid in my shoulder and pumped out it just before Olympic qualification. But acute pain in shoulder didn’t allow me to show my real shape there and forced me to finish the season immedi
ately after Olympic Games” told Nazarov to EME News. 30-year-old Tajik thrower resumed his practices only in January and spent all his preparation in native country. “There was a fantastic weather this year for home preparation. Czech Lukas Melich joined me in March for three weeks and we had a great training camp together. I have done all work planned for now despite I still feel little pain deep inside my injured shoulder but it doesn’t disturb me during my throwing trainings. But lets wait what will happen at the competitions.” After Tokyo Nazarov will continue in Belem, Brazil (May 12) and then at international meeting in Velenje, Slovenia on June 4.
DUSSELDORF (GER): The course record is the goal in the men’s race of the 11th Metro Group Marathon Duesseldorf this Sunday. Taking into account the enormous development of men’s elite marathon times this mark of 2:08:27 looks almost out of date. The best field ever assembled for the race is supposed to attack and lower the mark on Sunday. Seven runners will be on the starting line with personal bests of sub 2:10. The fastest on paper is Kenya’s Paul Biwott with a PB of 2:06:54. In contrast to the men’s race the women’s event has a clear favourite: Ethiopia’s Melkam Gizaw returns to the race at the river Rhine, where she finished third in 2012. Adding other events organisers registered around 14 000 athletes of which 4250 are marathon runners.
MONACO (MON): The 16th edition of the IAAF Combined Events Challenge starts with in exactly a week and the first of 15 meetings which will decide this year’s men’s and women’s winners will be the famous Multistars – Trofeo Zerneri Acciai meeting, which this year will be in the Italian city of Firenze (Florence) on 2-3 May. The Multistars meeting is one of five individual IAAF Permit meetings which are at the core of the Combined Events Challenge. Challenge points can also be accumulated at a number of Area competitions, the US Championships, the Universiade (World Student Games), Mediterranean Games, Francophone Games and, of course, the IAAF World Championships in Moscow this coming August. The Challenge rankings will be determined by the addition of the best three scores achieved by an athlete in any of the 15 competitions, and this determines who will get a share of over 200,000 USD in prize money when the season ends in Talence, France, on the weekend of 14-15 September.
GAVARDO (Italy): Top Italian sprinter Michael Tumi who won a bronze medal at 60 m during European Indoor Championships in Goteborg has announced his outdoor season debut for Italian meeting of Gavardo on May 19 at the 100 m with also a chance to run a 200 m in the same day.
RESULTS
BUENOS AIRES (ARG, Apr 25): Another national record for Argentinian olympic finalist in the shot put German Lauro. At home South American Grand Prix meet he improved by 9 cm to 20.98 m. His series: 20.69, 20.85, 20.98, f, 20.45 and 20.92. He confirmed so his second place in South American all-time lists. Talented Braian Toledo won the javelin 78.60, Jennifer Dahlgren again produced solid 72.24 in women hammer. Brazilian Jonathan do Nascimento won the 110 m hurdles in windy 13.69 (+2.7). Women pole vault saw Patricia Gabriela dos Santos clearing 443 cm.
ROMA (ITA, Apr 25): Sprint hurdler Marzia Caravelli improved Italian all-time best at 300 m hurdles to 39.56. She now thinks about trying seriously also the 400 m hurdles.
RIETI (ITA, Apr 25): At the 300 m Lorenzo Valentini achieved 32.99 and in women 300 m Maria Benedict Chigbolu 37.56.
POTSDAM (GER, Apr 24): Good results for youth thrower Henning Prufer with 20.47 in the shot put (5 kg) and 62.06 in discus (1.5 kg).
PATIALA (IND, Apr 25-26): Long jumper Ankit Sharma was the third athlete to defend the title on the third day of the Federation Cup with a leap of 791 cm. The team from Oil and Natural Gas Commission retained the overall trophy in the 17th Federation Cup. Siddhant Thingalaya posted 13.84 in the 110 m hurdles.
LUBBOCK (USA, Apr 25): At Red Raider Open meet fast sprints for Chavez Hart 10.09 (+0.7) ahead of Trevorvano Mackey of Bahamas 10.10. In the 400 m Vernon Norwood clocked 45.67. Jarvis Gotch leaped to windy 818 (+2.4) in the long jump. In women 100 m great 11.08 for Cierra White (+1.8). Katie Grimes clocked 12.78 in the 100 m hurdles but aided by +4.6.
BERGAMO (ITA, Apr 25): At a high jump men on a square of little village Pradalunga Marco Fassinotti cleared 220 over veteran Nicola Ciotti 210.
ZHUKOVSKIY (RUS, Apr 26): At Russian CC Championships Yegor Nikolayev in 11:17 won the 4 km ahead of Ilgizar Safiulin 11:20. Yuriy Chechun was the best at the 8 km 23:44. In women 2 km Yelena Kobeleva won in 6:07 ahead of
steeple world record holder Gulnara Galkina 6:08. Gulshat Fazlitdinova was the best in the 6 km in 20:13 over Yelena Sedova 20:18.
MUMIAS (KEN, Apr 26): At the 6th National Bank of Kenya/Athletics Kenya meeting at Mumias Sports Complex World Youth 3000 m bronze medallist Caroline Chepkoech stunned a classy line-up to wear the women’s 5000 m crown in 16:16.5. And her elder sister Mercy Cherono, the former world cross-country champion, also tore through the field to win 1500 m final in 4:25.3. Fancy Cherotich (4:26.3) came second as former Africa junior 800m sensation Lydia Wafula (4:27.0), two-time world cross-country junior champion Viola Kibiwott (4:27.8) and Magdaline Masai (4:30.2) followed. In the men’s front, little-known John Chepkwony showed no respect for former world cross-country champion Joseph Ebuya in 10,000m final with 29:14.8. Second Elkana Terer 29:15.3 and third Ebuya 29:15.7. Hillary Yego (8:33.3) stunned reigning Africa junior 5000 m champion Jairus Kipchoge (8:33.6) and Clement Kemboi (8:37.2) to in the steeple.
