Browsing: Florence

In what may be the most impressive victory of his short but brilliant career, 20-year-old Jakob Ingebrigtsen upset an exceptional 5000m field, including both the world champion and world record-holder, at the Wanda Diamond League meeting in Florence on Thursday (10).

The Norwegian wunderkind took a whopping 13 and a half seconds off his personal best to stop the clock in 12:48.45, a European record and his first sub-13 minute performance, having burned off the world’s most highly-credentialed 5000m runners over the last 200m of the race.

Ethiopia’s Hagos Gebrhiwet finished second in 12:49.02, ahead of Canada’s Mohammed Ahmed (12:50.12), but world record-holder Joshua Cheptegei paid for his early aggression, fading to sixth in 12:54.69.

“I’ve been doing a lot of good training but it’s just crazy to run this fast in an actual race and also take down the best runners in the world – that’s a lot of fun,’’ Ingebrigtsen said.

“I felt like I saved a lot of energy earlier in the race and I believe the guy that wanted to win the race the most, he won at the end, and that was me.”

The European 1500m and 5000m champion, Ingebrigtsen has targeted the 1500m for the Tokyo Olympic Games as the schedule does not allow for the double, and said this result would not alter his plans.

“I do a lot of training, so I know I’m able to run fast. At the same time, my main focus is not the 5km but most of my training is for the 5km, so for me to able to run fast in the 1500m, I know that I’m also able to run fast in the 5km.”

Hassan rebounds with strong 1500m win

Few athletes have ever had a more eventful week on the track than Sifan Hassan, who set a world 10,000m record on Sunday, lost it to her Ethiopian rival Letesenbet Gidey on Tuesday and rebounded to defeat an Olympic-strength 1500m field in Florence on Thursday.

Coming into the meeting, Hassan claimed that her endurance was better than her speed but when Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon challenged her on the final bend, the Dutch world champion found just enough strength to fight her off and claim the victory in a world-leading 3:53.63.

Kipyegon set a Kenyan record of 3:53.91 but it was still not enough. Laura Muir, in third, also set a near-PB of 3:55.59 in what was easily the fastest race of the year.

“I am so happy and I am so tired,’’ Hassan said afterwards.

“It was an amazing race. I thought Faith was going to beat me in the last 400m because I haven’t been working on speed and I just came from 10,000m so I don’t know where my speed came from, it surprised me.”

Regardless of this result she is not tempted to try to repeat the 1500m-10,000m double she achieved at the 2019 world championships, saying she wanted the fresh challenge of the 5000m-10,000m combination in Tokyo.

Another world champion who showed impressive speed was 200m title-holder Dina Asher-Smith, who was utterly dominant in her favoured event and would have cracked the 22-second barrier if there had been just a smidgen more following wind.

She was well-satisfied with the 22.06 clocking, with a slight tailwind, and believes she is in a good place with the Olympic Games just six weeks away.

“My team and I know I’m in good shape and I’m happy to come out and run that today, but I know I can go quicker so I’m excited to be able to go again,’’ she said.

The highly-credentialed Ivory Coast sprinter Marie-Josee Ta Lou set a season’s best of 22.58 but was some five metres in arrears.

Hurdles meeting records for McLeod and Camacho-Quinn

There were more fast times in the sprint hurdles as Olympic champion Omar McLeod and in-form Puerto Rican Jasmine Camacho-Quinn set meeting records. Camacho-Quinn clocked 12.38 to take down a 41-year-old record, while McLeod set a world-leading time of 13.01 in an equally convincing display.

European indoor 400m champion Femke Bol confirmed her good form with a Dutch record of 53.44 in the women’s 400m hurdles, which ranks her third fastest in the world this year, behind American pacesetter Sydney McLaughlin (52.83).

Morocco’s Soufiane El Bakkali established early season superiority in the 3000m steeplechase, clocking a world lead of 8:08.54 to defeat Bikila Tadese Takele of Ethiopia (8:10.56) and countryman Mohamed Tindouft (8:11.65). By contrast, the reigning world champion Conseslus Kipruto struggled to stay with the pace and dropped out midway through the race.

In the field, dual Olympic and world discus champion Sandra Perkovic rediscovered her top form to launch the plate 68.31m, her best throw for almost three years.

That was in the second round of the competition, but under the ‘final three’ format, she still had to register the best throw in the last round to claim the victory, which she did with a throw of 66.90m to down her great rival, the reigning world champion Yaime Perez (65.37m in the final round, after a best of 66.82m in the first round).

“I’m back,” an emotional Perkovic declared afterwards.

The 30-year-old Croatian has been searching for this rhythm all season and said this competition, likely to be her last before the Olympic Games, would give her the confidence she needed to contend for a third consecutive Olympic title.

New Zealand’s 2017 world champion Tom Walsh temporarily put aside his grief at the unexpected death of his agent Andy Stubbs last weekend to claim victory in the men’s shot put under the final three format. Walsh was third placed (21.43m) going into the winner-take-all final round but saved his best for last with a throw of 21.47m which Armin Sinancevic (20.93) and Leonardo Fabbri (19.82) could not match.

World pole vault champion Anzhelika Sidorova, competing as a neutral athlete, made an impressive return to international competition, clearing 4.91m to win the women’s pole vault, and a first-time clearance at 2.33m gave fellow neutral athlete Ilya Ivanyuk victory in the high jump on countback from Brandon Starc and Gianmarco Tamberi, who also cleared 2.33m. In a close competition, world champion Mutaz Essa Barshim was bumped off the podium, finishing in fifth place with a best height of 2.30m.

Nicole Jeffery for World Athletics

Photos by Diamond League AG

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There was inspiration aplenty to be found in the venue for today’s Wanda Diamond League press conference, the splendidly decorated main salon of the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, with its soaring painted ceiling and marble statues.

But when it came down to athletics, the assembled world champions and world record-breakers confessed that it was their competitors who gave them the most motivation to create their own masterpieces.

World 10,000m champion Sifan Hassan could have been deflated by the news overnight that her two-day-old world record of 29:06.82 had been vanquished by her Ethiopian rival, the world silver medallist Letesenbet Gidey, who soared to 29:01.03 at the Ethiopian Olympic trial held in Hengelo last night.

But Hassan said she relished the challenge, insisting that the developing rivalry between the two women was good for the event, good for the sport, and good for her.

She revealed that her manager had told her after her triumph in Hengelo on Sunday that Gidey would “go for the world record” at the same venue two days later.

“It makes me happy,” she said of Gidey’s performance.

“I want the 10,000m to be an event that people want to watch. I want it to be an event that’s exciting.

“Letesenbet is a very good athlete, she’s a very nice athlete and I really like her. She’s really sweet. People think I am not happy (about losing the world record) but I am really happy about it because I want distance to be more exciting.”

“I’m not surprised, and I’m actually happy about it!”@SifanHassan on losing her 10,000m world record just two days after getting it. #FlorenceDL #DiamondLeague pic.twitter.com/GwBppBKWGP

— Wanda Diamond League (@Diamond_League) June 9, 2021

Hassan said she hoped their respective performances would make the Olympic women’s 10,000m final one of the showpiece events of the Games.

“I am happy she ran faster than me because it will make me work harder for the Olympics and I will enter the event more excited. Congratulations to her.”

For similar reasons, Hassan is stepping down to the 1500m in Florence tomorrow, racing what she describes as her “favourite” event, even though she intends to do the 5000m-10,000m double in Tokyo.

She has not raced the 1500m since her triumph at the World Championships in Doha in 2019, and she is excited by the challenge of taking on the Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon and the European champion Laura Muir over the metric mile.

“I am really in good shape for my endurance but my speed is not yet quite good,” she said.

“I haven’t really raced the 1500 for two years but I am really happy to be here and take the opportunity, no matter what happens.”

World 5000m record-holder Joshua Cheptegei is similarly delighted by the impressive field assembled for his event, with seven sub-13 minute men assembled, alongside the young European champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen and the Gateshead Diamond League winner Mohammed Katir of Spain.

Cheptegei is having his first hit-out over the distance since he set the world record of 12:35.36 at the Monaco Diamond League meeting last September, and said he felt his form had improved since his season debut over 3000m at the Golden Spike meeting in Ostrava last month.

“I come here with new energy and new momentum,” he said.

“I am pretty sure the body is much better than in Ostrava and I can target a time of 12:40, or better.”

World 200m champion Dina Asher-Smith was asked for her reaction to dual Olympic 100m champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce’s sizzling 10.63 clocking in Jamaica last week, the fastest women’s 100m time in more than 30 years, and said she was inspired by such a performance.

“Shelly-Ann is absolutely amazing and I sent her a message saying it was amazing. The run itself was phenomenal. My coach sent me a video and said, ‘Look at her leg speed. That’ is what I’m talking about. You need to move your legs like that’. Obviously I am a competitive and I am always going to back myself but you can’t ignore the fact that Shelly-Ann is an amazing athlete.”

Asher-Smith said she was “still getting back into the swing of things” after taking a year out of top-flight competition during the pandemic last year but was confident that she would arrive at the Tokyo Olympics ready to race at her peak.

High jumpers Mutaz Essar Barshim and Gianmarco Tamberi already have a well-established mutual admiration club and hope their friendly rivalry will take them to greater heights tomorrow.

Asked what advice they would give each other, Tamberi, the Italian favourite, addressed his friend and said: “I don’t have anything to teach to this guy because he’s the best high jumper ever, but it doesn’t mean you are unbeatable, remember.”

World champion Barshim is still searching for his best form this year, with a best of 2.30m so far this season, but hopes his meeting with Tamberi and this year’s world leader Ilya Ivanyuk (2.37m) will help him find it.

“With a strong field you are going to perform much better,” Barshim said.

“There’s pressure, but I love that pressure – it only makes me better.”

World long jump champion Malaika Mihambo is also determined to step up a level in Florence after a subdued start to the season by her standards.

She takes on a high-quality field including fellow seven-metre jumpers Chantel Malone and Nastassia Mironchyk-Ivanova, two-time world triple jump champion Caterine Ibarguen, world indoor champion Ivana Spanovic and world silver medallist Maryna Bekh-Romanchuk.

“It’s the challenge that gives you the power to give your 100 percent,” she said.

Nicole Jeffery for World Athletics

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