Confidence high!
Thompson-herah highlights three Jamaican wins at Muller Anniversary Games
REIGNING Olympic Games sprint double champion Elaine Thompson-herah says yesterday’s win in the 200m at the Muller Anniversary Games in London, the seventh stop on the Wanda Diamond League circuit and the last before the start of the Tokyo Games, was a confidence booster.
She raced to a 22.43 seconds (0.2m/s) time and was one of three Jamaican winners on the day as national champions Ronald Levy and Stephenieann Mcpherson were also winners.
Thompson-herah, who was running the event for the first time since the Jamaican National Championships in late June, extended her perfect win streak in Europe this year to three-straight and was running in London for the first time in two years.
“It helps me to build my confidence to get that win on the board,” she said. “It may not be my fastest time but I’m still pleased with that.”
She pointed out areas where she needed to work on. “I need to get the work in to get that curve as quick as possible and keep pushing forward. Tokyo will be my second Olympics and I’m pretty excited now. I’ve been there and I know what it feels like and even though there are no crowds I will hope to put on a show.”
England’s Jodie Williams had a brilliant day at the meet as she ran a season’s best 22.60 seconds for the runner-up spot in the 200m and then placed second to Mcpherson in the 400m in a personal best 50.94 seconds, the best one-day 200m/400m sprint double ever by a British woman according to well-known track and field statistician Jon Mulkeen.
Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare was third in 22.61 seconds and Jamaican Natasha Morrison was eighth in 23.16 seconds.
Levy, the Commonwealth Games champion, made up a deficit in the final 30 metres to overhaul 2016 Olympic champion Omar Mcleod, who was racing for the first time since he finished last at the national trials.
Levy ran 13.22 seconds (0.8m/s), his third fastest of the season, as he took full advantage of Mcleod hitting the 10th hurdle and forced to settle for second in 13.42 seconds, with England’s Andrew Pozzi third in 13.45 seconds and Rasheed Broadbell fifth in 13.84 seconds.
The Jamaican champion said his aim was to execute properly and said while he fell short at the start he was able to make it up at the end. “I had some complications in Hungary but I didn’t let that get me down. I came out here to execute and win and I’m happy.”
Mcleod, who a day earlier had accused the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association (JAAA) of “robbing” him of a place on the Olympic team when he was in “world record shape”, said: “It was a good race seeing as I haven’t trained very hard since my Jamaican trials. I am a bit out of it, but happy to finish healthy.”
Mcleod, who was not named on the team despite his being the defending champion, added, “Now I’m just going to try and finish the season well and keep putting in the performances. I’ve got to get some quality work in and then we can see where we go from there.”
Mcpherson, who ran 50.44 seconds, snapping back-toback sub-50 seconds clockings, ran a well-paced race, coming off the curve first to runaway with the win. “It’s been a hard two weeks in training and I came out here to Gateshead to work on my technique and other areas. Now the preparation begins and watch out for Stephenie Mcpherson.”
Janieve Russell was third in the women’s 400m hurdles, running 54.66 seconds, beaten again by Holland’s Femke Bol with 53.24 seconds and American Shamier Little who was second with 54.53 seconds.
Danielle Williams was fourth in the 100m hurdles in 12.78 seconds (1.5m/s) and Britany Anderson was fifth in 12.81 seconds as Cindy Sember of Great Britain won in 12.69 seconds. Payton Chadwick of the USA was second in 12.75 seconds and Holland’s Nadine Visser ran a season best 12.78 seconds for third.