There were tears, but they were not loser’s tears for Franka Dietzsch as she retained her title in the Nagai Stadium tonight.
Competing at her ninth World championships, the German captured her third World gold after being proclaimed champion in 1999 and 2005.
After her shock defeat to the young Russian, Darya Pischalnikova, in the European championships last year, victory was all the sweeter.
This time round there was to be no mistake as the German stamped her name on gold in the very first round (66.61) and was never to be headed.
There were tears for Pishchalnikova too. Though she never seriously challenged Dietzsch, she improved her season’s best twice, equalled her PB and then capped that with a new all-time best of 65.78.
Bronze went to the PanAmerican and World Student Games champion, Yarelis Barrios of Cuba.
In the first round Dietsch was third up and shot straight into first with 66.61. As soon as she released she hopped up and down for joy, skipped out of the back of the circle, looking delighted with herself.
Up stepped Barrios, third best qualifier, to unleash a PB 63.90 to move into second and improve her lifetime best by almost half a metre.
In third at the end of the round was Poland’s Joanna Wisniewska on 61.35
Dietzsch’s second attempt was decent backup for the first with 66.48, not quite as far, but an indicator that everything was going well.
No one else in the final had thrown as far this year, so if they wanted to take the title from the German they were going to have to better themselves by some margin.
The only change of the round was Pischalnikova, elbowing aside Wisniewska to move into third with a 63.10.
But that was capped by two-time World medallist Grasu. With her third throw she supplanted the Russian with 63.14, 4cm up on the Russian.
But that only served to fire up Pishchalnikova who replied with a season’s best 65.14, almost a metre’s improvement and approaching her best ever of 65.55 set when taking the European title. Now she was in silver.
As the fourth round started the top three read: Dietzsch, Pishchalnikova, Barrios.
As the order was reversed and it was down to the final pool of eight, out went the 2003 champion, Iryna Yatchenko (BLR), who was one of the few who had qualified without difficulty.
Despite being the eighth longest thrower in the world this year, she could manage no better than 58.60.
The only athlete to improve her mark in the fourth round was the Russian who was on a roll, improving her PB to 65.78 to look secure in second.
So the competition entered its final phase, but try as they might, there were to be no last minute heroics from either Barrios or Pishchalnikova and the German entered the circle as World champion. Not surprisingly, with emotions high, the discus hit the stanchion but it didn’t matter anymore.
Osaka 2007 News Team/mb
