Jamaica sprints to seventh heaven
BEIJING: Even without Usain Bolt, Jamaica finished the world championships with a bang on Sunday, storming to the women’s 4x400m relay title to match Kenya’s gold tally at the top of the medals table.
Anchor leg Novlene Williams-Mills pulled out an eye-popping last 50m to catch Francena McCorory as the Jamaicans clocked this year’s best time of three minutes, 19.13 seconds to pip the United States on the line in Beijing.
“I came out here with a Jamaican ruff neck,” said third leg Stephenie Ann McPherson, using Jamaican slang for ‘street thug’, adding: “My team-mates did a great job.”
The Americans hit back to take the men’s 4x400m, veteran LaShawn Merritt passing Carl Lewis as his country’s most decorated male world championships athlete with 11 medals.
“That’s when you have the heart of a champion,” Williams-Mills said of her lung-bursting pursuit of McCorory.
“That’s what you do. These girls, they had it all the way.”
American star Allyson Felix looked to have dug the Olympic champions out of an early hole with a blistering third leg to give McCorory a lead into the last lap, until Williams- Mills kicked coming into the home straight to win it for Jamaica.
AYANA’S STUNNING RUN
Ethiopia’s Almaz Ayana put on a stunning display of front-run- ning to win the women’s 5,000 metres by more than 17 seconds and deprive compatriot Genzebe Dibaba of an unprecedented double gold.
The 23-year-old powered away from Dibaba with four laps to go and led home an Ethiopian podium sweep in a championship record time of 14 minutes 26.83 seconds.
Dibaba, who was hoping to become the first woman to win both the 1,500m and 5,000m at the same world championships or Olympics, was pipped at the line by compatriot Senbere Teferi.
CHINESE SPRING
It was a fitting end for the hometown fans at the Bird’s Nest.
China captured two more medals on the final day to cap an unexpectedly successful week with a record nine medals — more than double its total from Moscow two years ago. “We won medals across the disciplines,” said Du Zhaocai, director of the Chinese athletics association. “It’s a first for us in a worldclass event.”
On Sunday, Zhang Guowei won a silver medal in the men’s high jump and Lyu Huihui matched him in the women’s javelin.