Price breaks North American hammer record with 78.60m

In just her second competition of the year, world champion DeAnna Price of the USA added 36 centimetres to her own North American hammer record on Friday (9) at the Tom Botts Invitational in Columbia, Missouri, winning with 78.60m.

Her mark moves her up one place to third on the world all-time list behind world record-holder Anita Wlodarczyk and Germany’s Betty Heidler. It's also the best throw in the world since August 2018, and the best throw ever recorded within the first four months of the year.

Any one of Price’s six throws in Columbia would have been sufficient to win. She opened with 72.52m and then improved in each of the next four rounds, throwing 73.46m, 76.29, 77.20m and then 78.60m. She rounded out her series with 75.53m.

Canada’s Jillian Weir was second with 69.81m.

Less than 24 hours later, Brooke Andersen became the second US woman in history to throw beyond 78 metres.

Competing at the Wichita State Open in Kansas, the Pan-American silver medallist sent her hammer out to 78.18m to win the competition by almost 17 metres. The 25-year-old had a previous best of 76.75m.

Kilga smashes decathlon PB, Williams joins seven-metre club

Estonia's Karel Tilga produced a nine-second PB in the final discipline to win the decathlon at the Spec Towns Invitational in Athens, Georgia, on Saturday (10).

Garrett Scantling, the 2020 US indoor heptathlon champion, made a promising start in what is his first decathlon in almost five years.

The 27-year-old, who missed out on making the US Olympic team by just one place in 2016 and then moved to the NFL, kicked off his competition with a 10.83 clocking in the 100m before leaping a lifetime best of 7.56m in the long jump, following it with an outdoor shot put PB of 16.20m.

After clearing a solid 2.01m in the high jump, he ended his first day with a 400m PB of 48.61, bringing his score to 4406 – comfortably his best ever day-one tally.

But Tilga, the NCAA indoor heptathlon champion, was close behind with 4355, having set PBs in the long jump (7.69m) and high jump (2.10m).

Scantling maintained his lead for most of day two, posting the top marks of the field in the 110m hurdles (14.13) and pole vault (5.22m), the latter being held indoors due to torrential rain. Tilga continued to apply the pressure, though, with strong performances of 47.13m in the discus and 66.55m in the javelin.

Scantling went into the 1500m with a 157-point lead over Tilga - about 25 seconds in 1500m terms. Tilga's PB was only nine seconds faster than Scantlings - but that didn't stop him. The 2.00m (6ft 7in) tall Tilga opened up a significant gap on his US rival in the second half of the 1500m to stop the clock at 4:26.95, giving him a winning total of 8484. Scantling finished in 4:53.11, enough to give him a huge PB of 8476.

USA’s Kendell Williams produced the highlight of the first day of the meeting, but it wasn’t in the heptathlon, her specialist event.

Contesting the long jump, she sailed out to a lifetime best of 7.00m (1.4m/s) in the second round, then backed it up with leaps of 6.77m and 6.94m.

Nineteen-year-old Jasmine Moore, a triple jump specialist, was second with 6.83m while Chanice Porter was third with 6.77m.

NCAA indoor 200m champion Matthew Boling won the men’s long jump with 8.02m (1.4m/s).

Anna Hall, who turned 20 just three weeks ago, dominated the heptathlon to win with 6200. She set PBs in the 100m hurdles (13.64), high jump (1.88m), 200m (23.91), and long jump (6.03m) en route to her winning score.

Mboma breaks world U20 record 

Namibia's Christine Mboma clocked 49.24 to break the world under-20 400m record* at the Zambia Athletics All Comers Meet in Lusaka on Sunday (11).

Racing at the Heroes National Stadium which is at an altitude of 1279m, the 17-year-old finished just ahead of her fellow teenager and compatriot Beatrice Masilingi, who clocked 49.53.

Mboma’s time, which is a world lead, improves on the long-standing record of 49.42 set by Grit Breuer when claiming silver at the World Championships in Tokyo in 1991.

Both athletes, who are coached by Henk Botha, had also competed the day before, with Mboma running 2:03.27 for 800m and 18-year-old Masilingi clocking 22.72 for 200m.

*subject to the usual ratification procedures

Jon Mulkeen and Jess Whittington for World Athletics