Athletics Australia – News – DAY 7: Pearson makes statement as Frayne moves through

World-leading sprint hurdler Sally Pearson (Qld) confirmed her gold medal favouritism, on day seven of the IAAF world championships, by running 12.53 (-0.6 m/s) in round one of the women’s 100m hurdles, while Henry Frayne (Qld) qualified for the men’s triple jump final on his Flame debut.

Pearson arrived in Daegu (KOR) with a new 100m hurdles national record, the world-lead time of 12.48 and four Samsung Diamond League titles, plus an unbeaten run that extends back to August 2010.

The Olympic silver medallist lined up in lane two, heat two, but finished number one overall after a blistering 12.53 run. It is the fifth fastest time to be clocked this year and only Ginka Zagorcheva (BUL) has run faster in an opening world championship heat, back in 1987 on her route to gold in Rome.

Pearson said: “Not a bad start at all. I’m very happy with that, I just wanted to get out there, not take any risks, and just stayed relaxed and focused on what I had to do.

“My body wanted to run that fast so I let it. Not surprising really, because I’m in shape, I’m just satisfied that I’m through. I’ve got to do two more rounds now and have to stay focused on that.

“That was a heat, with no competition, so when I have competition and get a bit more fired up who knows what can happen.”

Having not raced since her win in London (GBR) last month, the Commonwealth champion admitted she had been counting down the days until competition started.

She continued: “I could feel that it was a good run but that’s what my plan was. I wanted to go out there and let me body do it. I just let it run as quickly as it wanted.

“I haven’t raced for three and a half weeks since London and I was getting a bit antsy and wanted to get out there. I raced to the best of my ability and it was surprisingly a really good run.”

With defending champion Brigitte Foster-Hylton (JAM) struggling for form and only just making it through qualifying, it is the three Americans who pose the greatest threat to Pearson.

All three won their respective heats with Kellie Wells the fastest in 12.73 (+1.0 m/s), Danielle Carruthers in 12.79 (0.0 m/s) and Dawn Harper in the final heat in 12.89 (+1.3 m/s).  Tiffany Ofili-Porter (GBR), who has three times finished third to Pearson this season, won the third heat in 12.84 (-1.6 m/s).

Having seen his training partner, Mitchell Watt (Qld), qualify for the long jump final yesterday, Frayne endured much better stadium conditions when he made his Flame debut in the men’s triple jump.

The 21-year-old impressed on his first attempt with an opening jump of 16.54m (0.0 m/s) before he improved to 16.83m (+0.2 m/s). His final effort, which was 25 centimetres behind the board, was 16.64m (+0.1 m/s). His second round jump was enough to secure a top 12 finish, to take him through to Sunday evening’s final

Frayne said: “I didn’t hit the 16.83m jump on the board, I was off the back so maybe it was a 17m jump to my toe but I certainly feel as though I’ve got a 17m jump in me, maybe 17m plus, I just need to hit it. I haven’t been doing a lot of jumping because of a few injuries but hopefully Sunday will be a bit a better.

“This season I haven’t been hitting my best jumps on my best attempt, but hopefully will fix that for the final because you need a good one to solidify my spot early on.

“I came with my eyes set on the top five or six so we will see how we go with that.”

Frayne arrived at the athlete village with some notable scalps this year including Olympic and world bronze medallist Leevan Sands (BAH), as well as a huge 17.04m jump in Barcelona (ESP), which elevated him to fourth on the Australian all-time list.

Sands was one of seven athletes who went beyond the automatic qualifying mark of 17.10m, which included reigning world champion Phillips Idowu (GBR).

In the women’s 4x400m semi-final, Australia finished sixth in a time of 3:32.27. Led off by Caitlin Sargent (Qld), the baton then went to Caitlin Pincott (NSW) and Lauren Boden (ACT) before Anneliese Rubie (NSW) brought it home. Without Allyson Felix or Sanya Richards-Ross, the USA won the heat in 3:23.57, followed by Ukraine and Belarus.

Also on track, Usain Bolt (JAM) returned after his false start in the 100m final. The 200m world-record holder looked in a relaxed mood as he strolled to a comfortable round one men’s 200m win in 20.30 (-0.3 m/s), the fastest time of the qualifiers.

Athletics Australia – News