RECORD BREAKER!
Dina Asher-Smith sets a new British record at the World Athletics Championships
Athlete Dina Asher-Smith made history on 29 September by becoming the first British woman in 36 years to win an individual World Championships sprint medal. The event was held in Doha – the capital city of the Middle Eastern country of Qatar.
Asher-Smith came second in the 100-metre sprint to Jamaica’s Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce with a personal best time of 10.83 seconds. This is a new record for a British woman and is the first medal Asher-Smith has won in an outdoors competition at a global level.
In the seconds before the race started, AsherSmith was thinking, “This is your time to go,” according to an interview with the BBC. To get ready for the tough competition at the World Athletics Championships, the athlete had avoided eating bread and sweets for several months. Baking did help her in some ways, however, as she tuned into
to help relax before the race began.
After the race, Asher-Smith told the BBC that she was pleased her efforts had paid off. She said, “I have worked so hard for these championships and hopefully I’ll go on to do even bigger things.”
Fraser-Pryce, who beat Asher-Smith by 0.12 seconds, was delighted with her own victory.
It was her fourth world championship title in the
100 metres – that’s more than the retired Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt – and came a year after the birth of her child, Zion. She said about her rival, “Dina had a personal best and that is awesome. She will inspire a lot of athletes in Britain.” Asher-Smith appeared in the 200-metre finals on 2 October, after The Week Junior had gone to press.