World champ Gatlin okay after hamstring scare in Zagreb race

Zagreb: reigning world 100 meters champion justin Gatlin should be back training within the week ater tests were negative for a possible hamstring injury, his manager told Reuters on Wednesday.

In the race at croatian capital zagreb the 37- year old Gatlin, ate rs lowing noticeably about 65 meters into a race he was leading, began grabbing his let hamstring around the 80m mark. He finished fourth with a time of 10.29sec and let the track supported by a fellow athlete.

Another american michael rodgers won the race with a wind assisted 10.04sec time.

“He said he started to feel something grabbing, so he immediately tried to protect against any potential injury occurring ,” renal do nehemiah said inane mail.

Tests to Gatlin’s hamstring “showed he still had 100 per cent strength in the leg and there were no adhesions or anything,” Nehemiah added.

It was the second time within a week the 37-yearold had slowed in a race while leading.

Gatlin finished fourth in the Zurich Diamond League final on Aug. 29 ater Nehemiah said he lost cadence ater stumbling out of the blocks.

Three days later the 2004 Olympic champion showed form, winning a 100 meters race in Switzerland in 9.97 seconds. The Zagreb race, on a relatively cool evening, was Gatlin’s last before defending his world title in Doha later this month.

He is expected to resume training in Florida several days ater returning home, Nehemiah said.

Meanwhile, World anti-doping watchdogs said Wednesday they would not challenge a decision by US anti-doping chiefs to clear sprinter Christian Coleman of alleged doping violations.

US sprinter Coleman, the fastest man over 100m this year, had faced a potential two-year suspension ate rd rug-testers reported they were unable to locate him on three separate occasions in a 12- month period.

However the US Anti-doping Agency (USADA) dropped the case ater determining that the timeframe exceeded the specified one-year period.

The world anti-do ping agency( wad a) said it would not appeal the decision as did the athletics Integrity Unity, set up by the IAAF as an independent body to police do ping in track and field. coleman’ s whereabouts failures were recorded on June 6 last year, on Jan.16 this year and Apr.26.

However Coleman successfully argued that the first missed case should have been backdated to the first day of that quarter -- Apr.1, 2018 -- meaning the three failures fell outside the required 12- month period.