Femke Bol at the 2020 Golden Spike Ostrava (© Pavel Lebeda, Ludek Sipla)
Olympic 400m hurdles bronze medallist Femke Bol is set to get her World Championships season underway with an attack on the world 300m hurdles best at the Golden Spike Ostrava, a World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meeting, on Tuesday 31 May.
The Dutch 22-year-old clocked 38.55 for the lesser-raced event in Ostrava in 2020, putting her second on the world all-time list behind Czech Republic’s two-time world 400m hurdles champion Zuzana Hejnova, who recorded the world best of 38.16 in Cheb in 2013. Now Bol has another opportunity to target that mark.
The Olympic medallist broke the European 400m hurdles record to secure her bronze medal in Tokyo, running 52.03 in a race won by USA’s Sydney McLaughlin in a world record of 51.46 ahead of her teammate Dalilah Muhammad with 51.58.
Bol then improved the Dutch indoor 400m record to 50.30 in February and won silver at the World Indoor Championships in Belgrade.
She now prepares to start her outdoor season at the Golden Spike meeting, where she will line up alongside Hejnova, British champion Jessie Knight and Slovak record-holder Emma Zapletalova.
The Golden Spike Ostrava is known for including non-traditional events, with the best 300m times in history having been set at the meeting. Wayde van Niekerk ran 30.81 in 2017, while Shaunae Miller-Uibo clocked 34.41 in 2019.
After racing in Ostrava, Bol is due to open her 400m hurdles season at the Fanny Blankers Koen Games, also a World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meeting, in Hengelo on 6 June.
Already announced for the Golden Spike Ostrava is Olympic champion Gianmarco Tamberi, who will take on Commonwealth champion and Oceanian record-holder Brandon Starc, Olympic finalist Tom Gayle of Great Britain, Czech champion Marek Bahnik and European U23 champion Jan Stefla, also of the Czech Republic, in the high jump.