Report25 May 2016


Elemba beyond 21 metres in Dakar

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Congolese shot putter Franck Elemba (© Getty Images)

Congolese shot putter Franck Elemba provided the highlight of the IAAF World Challenge meeting in the Senegalese capital Dakar when he set a national record of 21.01m on Wednesday (25).

The effort added 48 centimetres to the African Games champion's previous best, set indoors in Karlsruhe earlier this year.

He is just the third African putter over 21 metres after South Africa’s Janus Robberts, who holds the African record with 21.97m, and Nigeria’s Stephen Mozia.

Elemba started the competition in fine fashion, reaching a personal best of 20.82m with his opening effort, and then produced his big put in the fifth round. Brazil’s Darlan Romani was second with 20.64m.

The meeting also incorporated the IAAF Hammer Throw Challenge and the men’s and women’s events were won by Pavel Bareisha from Belarus and Moldova's Zalina Marghieva, who won with 75.29m and 71.91m respectively.

Both contests were close with Bareisha just beating Marghieva’s brother Serghei Marghiev by 16 centimetres while his older sister triumphed over Germany’s 2007 world champion and former world record-holder Betty Heidler, who threw 71.40m.

US long jumper Jarvis Gotch, who set a legal personal best of 8.24m last month, was blown to a winning distance of 8.31m with the last jump of the competition, aided by a strong 4.0m/s wind on his back.

Gotch had already got the competition well won as the only jumper beyond eight metres, with 8.01m (1.2m/s) in the third round and then reaching a legal 8.17m (1.5m/s) with his fifth effort.

The men’s sprints were also wind-assisted with the plaudits in the 200m going to Ivory Coast’s Ben Meite, who won in 20.47 (3.5m/s) with Gambia’s Adama Jammeh second in 20.53.

USA’s Jeff Porter and South Africa’s Antonio Alkana were both timed at 13.40 (2.3m/s) in the 110m hurdles with the verdict went to the US sprint hurdler.

By contrast, the wind died down for the women’s sprints. USA’s Alexandria Anderson won the 100m in 11.26 (0.4m/s) and there was another US winner in the women’s 100m hurdles with Christina Manning taking the victory in 12.94 (0.1m/s).

Britain's world 400m finalist Rabah Yusif won over one lap of the track in 46.08 while Botswana’s Lydia Jele took 0.39 off her personal best to win the women’s event in 52.18.

In the 400m hurdles, Poland's Joanna Linkiewicz won in 56.56, coming home 0.14 ahead of Ukraine’s Anna Titimets.

Djibouti's 19-year-old Abdi Waiss Mouhyadin was an impressive winner of the men’s 1500m in 3:36.87 while Kenya’s Margaret Kipkemboi took the women’s 3000m in 8:54.79.

Phil Minshull for the IAAF

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