KJT FEELS ON TOP OF THE WORLD
Katarina Johnson-Thompson celebrates after claiming her first major athletics title by winning pentathlon gold at the World Indoors in Birmingham last night. Now she is targeting a treble in 2018
IN the space of a pentathlon on Friday, Katarina Johnson-thompson ran, jumped and threw her way out of the realm of perennial underachiever and into one reserved for world champions.
Granted, there will be some discussion over the value of her gold, given the relative weakness of this World Indoor Championships field and the good-yetun-spectacular nature of her performance.
But it is a major breakthrough nonetheless and one that has been a long time in coming for an athlete who blitzed all-comers in the juniors before going 14th, fifth, 28th, sixth and fifth in her five heptathlons at world and Olympic level.
Against that sequence of results, a medal, let alone a gold, has felt increasingly important for Johnson-thompson, who has been asked as many questions about her temperament as her suspect throwing scores.
the hope now is that this gold will take away some of the baggage she seems to feel in the open air, not to mention the fact it might just serve as the first stage of a 2018 treble, with heptathlon tilts approaching in the Commonwealth Games and european Championships.
that appears distinctly possible for a 25-year- old who has never looked short on talent. A tearful Johnson-thompson said: ‘It is just so special and I am so happy. I’ve dreamt of this for so long, so to come here and to do it at a home champs, it’s something I’ll dream of for the rest of my life.’
She added: ‘ this year it’s all about winning medals and titles, something I haven’t done, so hopefully this can be the springboard to many more.
‘I said to myself I wanted two golds and one other medal, but I would love three golds.
‘this gives me confidence and belief going to the Commonwealth Games that I can compete at a certain level and come away with a medal and not screw it up.’
Johnson-thompson was the pre- event favourite here in the absence of the top three from London 2017, including Belgium’s world and Olympic champion Nafissatou thiam, but she was in second place after the morning session.
She had been sixth quickest over the 60m hurdles, then topped the high-jump standings with 1.91m. her throw of 12.68m in the shot ranked ninth but, as a personal best in her weakest discipline, it left her in good shape, just 13 points behind Cuba’s Yorgelis Rodriguez.
the Brit started the evening session by winning the long jump with a moderate distance of 6.5m — 43cm down on her personal best — and went into the 800m 33 points clear of Austria’s Ivona Dadic. that offered potential for drama, but Johnson-thompson won the final event convincingly, coming home in 2:16.63.
It gave her 4,750 points — 250 down on her personal best but 50 clear of Dadic in second place. Rodriguez took bronze.
elsewhere, Laura Muir went through to today’s 1500m final by finishing her heat second to Genzebe Dibaba. the Scot is chasing her second medal of the championships after taking 3,000m bronze on thursday.
TV: World Indoor Championships, LIVE on BBC 2 9.45am-1.30pm and 5.30pm-9.30pm.