V13 n. 73 Day Two World Championships

Women's 20Km race walk 

Okay Track Fans if you are of Spanish heritage it is an unbelievably great day.  Icing on the cake of their women's World Cup soccer win is the result of the women's 20Km walk, putting Spain at the top of world class race walking with their victory in the men's race yesterday.

Here are the results:    1. Maria Perez  (Spain)   1 hr 26 min 51 sec

                                    2. Jemima Montag (Australia)  1 hr  27 min 16 sec  NR

                                    3. Antonella Palmisano (Italy)  1 hr 27 min 26 sec

                                    4. Kimberly Garcia-Leon (Peru) 1 hr 27 min 

Okay, we know that race walking is what few people pay to see.  Nowdays they don't even allow the walkers into the stadium, but I thought, if they are on the program they deserve a few words.  

Now into the stadium.   

Women's Heptathlon

 Anna Hall shows great fortitude in that final event the 800 meters knowing that she needs a three second win over Katarina Johnson-Thompson (This is too big a mouthful for the announcers, so they call her KJT) of Great Britain, and Hall gives it everything going out maybe a bit hard in 56 seconds, but she holds form down the backstretch, through the turn and down the home stretch but not quite keeping the gap she needs. I don't believe she ever looked back. And Johnson-Thompson hangs tough as well for her thirty years of age, and a repaired Achilles tendon stays within 1.5 seconds and wins the overall scoring  6740 to Hall's 6720.  Third is Annouk Vetter of Holland with 6501 points.

                                          Ethan Katzberg,  Nanaimo, British Columbia and Canada

The big news for Canadians and especially for this writer who lives on Vancouver Island is Ethan Katzberg who comes out of the shadows and takes the hammer throw with a Canadian National Record 81.25 meter throw over Wojciech Nowicki  of Poland whose 81.02 meters is good enough for second and hometown hero Bence Halasz of Hungary bags third place with a season best 80.82 meters.  Katzberg comes from Nanaimo on the east coast of Vancouver Island.  Looks like he could have played lead guitar in a 70's rock band or was a 19th century Hungarian count.   According to the WC website, Katzberg's previous best was 76.36 meters last year in Birmingham, England where he was second in the Commonwealth Games.

10,000 Meters Men was run in 90 degrees Fahrenheit and high humidity.  Enough to wilt a cactus. It was not a day for records but it was still a day for testing each other and the lads did a job.  But they were not to phase Joshua Cheptigei of Uganda or deter him from winning his third world championship in 27:51.42 his season best.    

2nd   Daniel Ebengo of Kenya in 27:52.60, 

3rd    Solemon Barega Ethiopia in 27:52.72, 

4th Berihu Aregwai, Ethiopia, 27:55.71 

5th Benard Kebet Kenya 27:56.27, 

6th Mo Ahmed, Canada 27:56.43, 

7th Rodrigue Kwizera, Burundi 28:00.29.  

11th Woody Kinkaid US  28:08.71.  

Ebengo really looked like he might take it away from Cheptigei near the end of the last turn but Cheptegei had a lot more in the bag and he took it out and used it.  He didn't look at all tired at the end of the race.  The Kenyans and Ugandans always look really friendly after their races.  They are closely related and live right on the Kenya Uganda border near each other.  

Splits as follows for the 10,000 with lap leaders as well:

400 Ayeko Uganda  62.86

800   "            "       69

1200  "           "       71

1600    "        "        70

2000    "        "        69

2400    "        "        70

2800    "        "        71

3200   Kibet  Ken    70

3600    Ayeko Ug     69

4000        "        "      71

4400    Kibet  Ken    66  Ayeko drops out

4800    Aregawi Eth    69

5200         "          "       69

5600    Kibet    Ken      69

6000        "        "        69

6400    Berega  Eth     66  It's starting to get interesting

6800    Aregawi Eth    66

7200         "         "       65

7600        "          "        65

8000        "          "        65

8400        "           "        64

8800        "            "        67

9200        "            "        65

9600    Cheptegei  Ken    60 Now it's getting really interesting

10,000        "            "        54

Women's Long Jump Finals

1. Ivana Buleta,  Serbia                    7.14        23' 5"

2. Tara Davis Woodhall,  US            6.91        22' 8"

3. Alma Rotaru-Kottman Romania   6.88       22'   6 1/2"

Women's Discus prelims

Valerie Allman's leading throw is 67.14 meters   

Nearest followers are"

Bing Fen   China    65.68

Sandra Perkovic Croatia    65.62

Claudine Vita Germany    64.51

Laulauga Tausaga             64.34

High Jump   Men   12 Qualifiers at 2.28  including   current Olympic, World Indoor, two time Euro and two time Diamond League finals champ Gianmarco Tamberi and former world champ  Mutz Essa Barsham of Qtar.

JuVaugh Harrison of the US advances.

Women's 400 Meters  22 qualifiers.  Only one under 50 sec. is Marileidy Parlimo of Dominican Republic at 49.90.   It will pick up in the next round.

Men's 400IH Prelims    22 advance in first round  Alison Dos Santos Brazil has best time at 48.12.

4th  Rai Benjamin 48.35,  5th C.J. Allen  48.36,  16th Karsten Warholm  48.76.  

Men's 100 meters

Okay, I know,  why am I only mentioning American sprinter Noah Lyles win so late in the post?  'Cause it was the last event of the day.  Noah Lyles got his start under control and did an incredible last 40 compared to his opponents.  I tried to judge the body language of the entries as they came out on the track.  Thought they all looked very confident, but when Lyles did that two legged hop up before getting in the blocks, I felt the race had already been won although I was pulling for the young Jamaican Oblique Seville who came 4th in 9.88.  Biggest surprise maybe was Leslie Tebogo of Botswana in second with a 9.88 a national record.  Lyles had a world leading 9.83.  Third was ever reliable Zharnel Hughes of Great Britain in 9.88.    What happened to Fred Kerley in the semis?  He was not interviewed on NBC. Looking at results there were three heats in the semis with first two in each heat advancing and the next two fastest from those three heats.  Fred was third in his heat with a season best of 10.05, not a time to write home about in this rarified level of competition.   Lamont Marcell Jacobs, Italy's reigning Olympic 100 Meters champ, likewise can only produce a Season Best 10.05 which was also  not good enough to move on.

George,

Kerley was interviewed “live” and when asked what happened, he said “I fucked up”. 

That interview must have been deleted on the delay broadcast.

I think that statement described his race pretty well. 

John Perry

George,

It was live and the word “fuck “ was deleted from the caption. Interviewer also remarked that the language was unacceptable. As I recall, the interview was ended immediately. 

Don’t know how many viewers saw that interview but I did! 

John P 

No problem, John,  "fuck" is now common in the vocabulary of a lot of 4 year olds.

George

Tebogo was only seventh best of those qualifying to the finals but he got second in the big race.

Our colleague and astute observer Richard Mach describes Lyles' finish.

Lyles' start today was one of his better ones among a # of abysmal ones. But his last 40 and now 50 m is like the freight training coming screaming thru town round midnight stopping for nothing ….. the engineer unconscious on the deck — broken whisky bottle nearby — and a fireman with no knowledge of how to slow the speeding mass down.  I am predicting he will run under his 200 m 19.31 PB in good conditions if the surface is fast and he blows the turn up. He is in his prime and well knows Knighton is waiting for him on the downside.   

And  a further observation from Monsieur Mach on the Men's 1500 prelims

Ingebrigtsen’s showboating off the last turn in the 2nd semi will rapidly become tiresome and the youthful phenom who left his father’s coaching in 2021 will have more and more fans wanting to see him beaten.  The 1500 final is Nuguse vs Jakob.  Still remember the look on Norway's best when Wightman went by him 250 m out from the line last year.  He can be beaten and his greatest vulnerability lies in his leaving his humility behind.  Nuguse’s earlier performances this year and his flowing almost effortless biomechanics portend something spectacular in the last 40 m.  After ratcheting up the pace, Ingebrigtsen will light up the afterburners 150 m out in the middle of the last turn and Yared needs to be on his shoulder matching him stride for stride.  And then it will be Will against Will to the line. 

Note;  I will not have access to meet on TV until next weekend so will rely on your efforts for what you see.  I will interpret from the post race results for tomorrow's posting.

This comment on my screen today from my good friend John Cobley who wrote racingpast.ca for many years.

George: Enjoying your reporting, although I thought you were hard on the CBC for women’s 10,000 coverage. By the way, there is coverage in the evening each day of the worlds—on CBC.

Katzberg. Don’t know the fellow but had a lot to do with his coach Dylan Armstrong. Watched him develop in BC Junior Development program. In that program young athletes had to do all events, not just their specialty. Dylan was at the fore from the start and of course went on to international fame—see him on Wikipedia. I must have typed his name hundreds of times when working for BC athletics. Dylan was originally a hammer thrower himself and benefitted from the coachig of the great Russian hammer thrower Bondarchuk who amazingly ended up in Kamloops (British Columbia). Don’t know if he’s still there.