© Copyright – 2015 – Athletics Illustrated
The morning session, as it is here in North America for the 2015 IAAF World Track and Field Championships, witnessed a 400-metre final that was out of this world.
The top three finishers were Wayde van Niekerk of South Africa in the time of 43.48, LaShawn Merritt of the US in 43.65, which was a small personal best result and Kirani James of Grenada who finished in 43.78.
For the top three finishers to all be under 44 seconds is incredible. Consider that American Michael Johnson, marked as the greatest 400-metre runner in history owns the world record at 43.18, which he accomplished in 1999. There are only 62 total performances all-time that were run under the 44-second benchmark by 14 athletes, three of those 14 were in this race. The next three finishers ran just over 44 seconds in 44.11, 44.63 and 44.68. Dead last still ran 45.15. The sixth, 11th and 25th fastest times in history were run today.
The Kenyans have expanded outside of the middle and long distances to the sprints and field events and have started medalling there. Today Julius Yego earned a gold medal in the Javelin with a toss of 92.72-metres. Ihab Abdelrahman El Sayed of Egypt finished second in 88.99m, while Finn Tero Pitkämäki had a best result of 87.64m. This is the very first field events medal for Kenya.
In the women’s 3,000m steeplechase final Kenyan Hyvin Jepkemoi won in the time of 9:19.11, she was followed in by Habiba Ghribi of Tunisia and Gesa Krause of Germany who finished in the times of 9:19.24 and 9:19.25, respectively.
In the women’s 400-metre hurdles Czech athlete Zuzana Hejnova won in the time of 53.50 seconds over Americans Shamier Little who finished in 53.94 and Cassandra Tate with her finish time of 54.02.
For all the stories and results click here.
