UK Olympic Trials - World champion Gardener heads to Athens

Manchester, EnglandJason Gardener’s “roller coaster” year swept to a new high at the Norwich Union Olympic Trials and AAA championships in Manchester this evening when he took the men’s 100m title by one hundredth of a second from World bronze medallist Darren Campbell, and all but guaranteed his place on the plane for Athens.

“The most important race of my life”

A year ago Gardener, nicknamed the Bath Bullet, misfired badly when he finished fourth at these championships and missed out on a place in the Paris World championships team. He bounced back to win the World Indoor 60m crown in Budapest in March, but then immediately went under the surgeon’s knife for a double hernia operation that severely hampered his preparations for the outdoor season.

The high of becoming a father for the first time in April then gave way to the frustrations of training with troubling scar tissue and the lows of suffering indifferent early season form that left him with a modest season’s best of 10.28 before today. That made him the fourth quickest in the field this year, with only the first two and fast times guaranteeing Olympic selection.

But today Gardener put all that behind him to eclipse his rivals in what he described later as “the most important race of my life”. In a desperately close finish Gardener out-dipped Campbell, clocking 10.22, an impressive time given the 1.2m/s headwind. He immediately raised his arms, pointing to the sky in triumph – apparently the only person in the stadium who was sure he had got it.

Campbell edged out former World Junior champion Mark Lewis-Francis by the same slim margin for second place, with new boy Nick Smith clocking a personal best 10.28, only four hundredths behind the medallists. With Christian Malcolm fifth in 10.29, the top five were separated by only seven hundredths.

"A massive win"

“That was a massive win,” said Gardener. “It has been a real uphill struggle with the problems I’ve had. I want to thank Malcolm Arnold my coach – he is the man for getting athletes ready when they need to be, and I was ready.

“It has been a roller coaster for me, but now I have got time to prepare myself for the Olympics, and that is what I needed today.”

Strictly speaking, Gardener isn’t totally sure of his Olympic place yet as, under UK Athletics rules, he needed to break the federation’s special “enhanced” standard of 10.12 here to be an automatic choice. He broke the Olympic “A” standard of 10.21 last year, but UKA rules for selection state: “2003 qualifying marks will only be accepted where it can be justified that there was a valid reason for not recording the standard in 2004.”

Having endured a double hernia operation, however, and given his form running into the blustery headwinds blowing around the Manchester Regional Arena today, the selectors are almost sure to pick Gardener and name Campbell and Lewis-Francis too, when they meet to make their decisions early next week.

Awful weather doesn’t dent spirit

Manchester’s biting wind and persistent drizzly rain made conditions distinctly chilly for the athletes and spectators alike, yet the battle for places in the men’s 400m rose towards boiling point in the afternoon thanks to the last minute presence of a newcomer – a newcomer to Britain that is, not the event.

US import

Malachi Davis, a 26 year-old American with a British mother, arrived in the UK for the first time in his life on Friday morning, bearing a brand new British passport that had been couriered to his California home at 2pm on Thursday by the British Home Office. Five hours later he was on a flight to London, and less than 48 hours later he was in north west England winning the first heat of the men’s 400m in 46.10, beating former World Indoor champion Jamie Baulch and Scotland’s Ian Mackie in the process, putting both out of tomorrow’s final and pushing them off the Olympic team.

Davis, ranked 23rd in the USA, has a personal best set this year of 45.52 – inside the Olympic qualifying time and quicker than all but two British runners, Daniel Caines and Tim Benjamin, who he will meet in the final tomorrow. A top-two place will ensure his selection for Athens.

Davis’s chances in the final may depend how quickly he can adjust to the time difference and get used to the utterly foreign weather conditions. “It’s very cold here,” said Davis, who ran his pb in the warmth of southern California. “But the crowd and the energy is terrific.

“I have heard about Daniel Caines and other British quarter milers – very excellent quarter milers. It’ll be a good race, I just hope I can get over the jet lag in enough time for tomorrow’s final.”

Olympic dream – Sanchez’ advice

Davis explained his 11th hour decision to chase a British Olympic place. “I’ve been doing track pretty much my whole life, and like any athlete I want to pitch myself at the highest level. My dream is to go to the Olympic Games,” he said. “The idea came up earlier this year to compete in the British trials and I jumped at it. It’s exciting. I barely qualified for the US trials.”

Ironically, Davis was born in Sacramento, where the US trials are taking place this week. His mother, Ava Gordon, moved from London to the United States nearly 30 years ago, but it wasn’t until the beginning of this season that he first thought about applying for dual citizenship – partly, he explained, thanks to advice from 400m hurdler Felix Sanchez, who was born in New York but runs for the Dominican Republic.

“I have a lot of friends who were born and raised in the States but compete for other countries, people like Felix Sanchez,” said Davis. “Felix suggested I look into it. I’d never really considered it before.”

Davis, who had never set foot out of the United States until he competed in a meeting in Vancouver, Canada, two weeks ago, is prepared for the inevitable criticism his late claim for British citizenship is bound to bring.

“I figure if you’re doing something right you’re going to have critics, you’ve got to worry when you don’t have critics,” he said. “Yes, I may well deprive someone of an Olympic place but emotions are always high in an Olympic year. It’s all down to the best athletes to qualify.

“It’s difficult for you to ask where my allegiances lie as I have an American father and a British mother, it’s like saying which parent do you like most.”

Shaw – Championships record

The cold and wind was not only a shock to the man from “across the pond”, however, for it played havoc all day, eliminating any chance of blistering times on the track, although the crowd warmed to some big performances in the field. Hammer thrower Lorraine Shaw returned to something like her best form, breaking the championships record with a second round effort of 68.11m, her best of the year. Shaw was particularly pleased to win her seventh title because she has been under pressure to maintain her UK number one spot from former ballet dancer Shirley Webb.

“It meant a lot to me today because this is my tenth season and I’ve been the UK’s number one for ten years, and that means a hell of a lot,” she said. “I’m just a little bit disappointed I didn’t break the British record because I need a new car.”

Sayers qualifies

A car is awarded to any national record breaker by one of UKA’s sponsors. Two years ago javelin thrower Kelly Morgan took one home after she had roused the Manchester crowd by breaking the British record at the Commonwealth Games trials, held at the nearby City of Manchester stadium. She was back in action today after two years of injuries, but the roars were for her rival Goldie Sayers who forced the spear beyond the Olympic qualifier for the first time with the very last throw of the competition.

Sayers, a former European junior silver medallist, sent the spear out to 60.85m, 35 centimetres beyond the qualifying distance. “I knew it was in there, it was just about relaxation,” she said. “It’s such a technical event, it’s all about rhythm and timing and you can’t get too psyched up about it otherwise you lose the relaxation. I just had to get my body parts in the right place and I knew it would fly if I did, and I did.

“There couldn’t have been a better way to finish that competition, it was the best competitoin I have been in for the atmosphere, even though it was raining.”

Lewis on song too

Sayers’ winning throw was a personal best, and back in fourth place Olympic heptathlon champion Denise Lewis also produced the longest effort of her life. The 31 year-old’s 51.48m was 35 centimetres beyond her previous best, achieved in 2000. Earlier she had run 13.82 in the heats of the 100m hurdles, not quick enough to advance to the final, won later by Sarah Claxton in 13.21.

“I am really pleased with the javelin. It’s the first time this year I’ve had a pb in anything,” she said “I’ve been improving after a few injuries, and I’m feeling good. I’m making no predictions, but the Olympics is always a great occasion.”

Unlike Sayers, long jumper Chris Tomlinson, failed to produce a glorious final effort. He too had already won the competition, with 7.84m, but has yet to leap the Olympic qualifier of 8.19m. “The Olympic standard is far too long,” he said afterwards. “That sort of distance is good enough to win a medal never mind just get to Athens. Why has the long jump qualifying distance shot up? The track qualifying hasn’t gone up that much.”

It was agony too for Michelle Griffith who won the women’s Triple Jump in 13.43m, her best of the year but some way short of the qualifying mark.

Blackpool Tower – 20.84 Shot – but felled in the Discus

There is agony of another sort for Carl Myerscough. He won the men’s Shot Put with ease, throwing 20.84m, more than three metres better than anyone else in the competition and well beyond the qualifying standard. Myerscough will not be in Athens, however, as he is ineligible because of a previous drugs ban. He then returned to the arena for the Discus Throw, but was robbed of a unique double in the final round by Emeka Udehcuku whose last effort of 61.60m eclipsed the “Tower’s” best by six centimetres. It was the penultimate throw of the competition, and a welcome present for Udechuku whose 25th birthday is tomorrow.

The women’s 100m was almost as close as the men’s, Abi Oyepitan outdipping Joice Maduaka by two hundredths, 11.54 to 11.56. And Robert Newton took the men’s 110m hurdles in 13.72.

Holmes quickest

Kelly Holmes was the fastest qualifier for tomorrow’s final of the women’s 800m, clocking 2:01.62. Jo Fenn is also safely through, winning her heat in a relaxed 2:05.74.

The men’s 800m heats produced a ‘world record’. It went to Paralympic athlete Danny Crates, an arm amputee who finished sixth in his heat, clocking 1:53.27, a second and a half inside the previous world best figures for his Paralympic catgeory.

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Matthew Brown for the IAAF