DEFAR AND DIBABA FINALLY TO DUEL AT THE GREAT NORTH RUN

Ethiopia's Meseret Defar and Tirunesh Dibaba, winners of the IAAF World Championships Moscow 2013 5000m and 10,000m gold medals last week, will compete at next month's Bupa Great North Run, an IAAF Gold Label Road Race, in Newcastle on 15 September.

 The pair of superstars have been intense and sometimes bitter rivals in their international careers, which extend back a decade and their presence in this Half Marathon, which has attracted 56,000 runners of all abilities, promises to match the quality of the men's contest featuring fellow Olympic and World champions Mo Farah, Kenenisa Bekele and Haile Gebrselassie.

 Defar and Dibaba are both at the experimental stages in their Half Marathon careers.However, they already have very high profile successes under their belts despite their inexperience over the distance.

Dibaba defends

Last year's Bupa Great North Run saw Dibaba, on her debut, win a thriller ahead of Kenya's Edna Kiplagat in a very fast time of 1:07:35 seconds. In February, Defar ran 10 seconds quicker in New Orleans.