Rabat: Samaai Flies to Victory

49The South African had to come from behind after Australia’s IAAF World Championships Beijing 2015 silver medallist Fabrice Lapierre jumped 8.31m in the third round but then he uncorked his winning leap on round later.

Lapierre improved to 8.36m in the fifth round, albeit with a massive following wind of 5.2mps, but had to settle for second after neither man could improve with their last efforts.

USA’s world leader Marquise Goodwin, who jumped 8.45m in Guadeloupe a week ago, in imperial measurement was more than a foot short of that mark and finished third with 8.11m.

Katerina Stefanidi made a big addition to the African all-comers’ record, which had stood at 4.56m, when she cleared a meeting record of 4.75m, going well clear at that height before failing at 4.80m.

Switzerland’s Nicole Buchler cleared 4.70m before passing at 4.75m but she then also failed at what would have been a national record height of 4.80m and finished second.

Ibarguen win streak now 33

Caterine Ibarguen extended her women’s triple jump to 33 competitions with slightly more ease than expected.

The Colombian two-time world champion, jumping last out of the seven women, led from the first round with her opening effort of 14.38m, which itself would have sufficed for the win.

She improved to 14.41m in the second round and, with the competition won, bounded out to 14.51m with her final effort despite being someway behind the edge of the board.

All the competitors had some slight problems with the swirling breeze, which doubtless had some effect on the distances but Greece’s Paraskevi Papachristou fared the best of the rest and twice jumped 14.28m in the first and fourth rounds, to take second place.

The challenge of Venezuela’s 2016 world indoor champion Yulimar Rojas never materialised as she struggled to put her phases together and, after pushing Ibarguen hard at the opening IAAF Diamond League meeting in Doha, she had to settle for fourth place with a relatively modest 14.11m.

Piotr Malachowski was an equally convincing winner of the discus, Poalnd’s 2015 world champion unleashing three throws better than anyone else could manage.

His third round 65.91m took him into the lead and he improved to 66.88m. With the competition won, he then reached a meeting record of 67.45 with the last throw of the competition for his second consecutive Diamond Race victory.

His compatriot Robert Urbanek got third place courtesy of his fifth round effort of 65.04m.

Palameika gets wind assistance

The women’s javelin turned out to be slightly strange affair, not that Latvia’s Madara Palameika will mind.

In the third round, the wind blew the way she wanted and Palameika launched her implement out to 64.76m, more than four metres further than anyone else at that stage in the competition.

Estonia’s Liina Laasma closed over the next two rounds, throwing 62.41m with her fourth effort and then adding 48cm to her national record with 63.65m in the fifth round to finish second; but the only other women over 60 metres was Australia’s Kathryn Mitchell, who throw 60.68m with her first effort and then had five fouls.

Bogdan Bondarenko jumped 2.36m just under a year ago in Rabat but on this occasion he needed only 2.31m to secure the win and 10 Diamond Race points.

The 2013 world champion slithered over his winning height on his second attempt, the bar twitching after being stroked by the Ukrainian’s backside but it stayed on the uprights before three failures at 2.34m brought the contest to an end.

Doha winner Erik Kynard finished second on this occasion as the only man to also get over 2.28m, having a clean sheet and also leading throughout the rather lacklustre contest before being unable to negotiate 2.31m.

Gianmarco Tamberi had an unhappy start to his outdoor campaign as Italy’s 2016 world indoor champion, who seemed to fly with ease over heights of 2.30m or more this winter, only managed 2.25m on his third attempt and, going no higher, he finished down in sixth.


Phil Minshull for the IAAF and the IAAF Diamond League