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| File photo: Kirani James & Rondell Bartholomew |
by Michael
Bascombe
DAEGU, South Korea, August 28, 2011 – Grenada’s two marquee athletes go into action on Sunday morning (Saturday
night Eastern Caribbean Time) on the second day of the IAAF World Championships
in Athletics.
First to
take the track will be Rondell Bartholomew in Heat 1 of the men's 400m from
about 11:15 a.m. (10:15 p.m. Saturday) while Kirani James competes about 24
minutes later in Heat 4.
Bartholomew,
who will be running out of a comfortable lane 3, should have no worries
qualifying for the semis.
However, he
should expect some competition from the experienced Greg Nixon of the USA who
has a personal best of 44.61 and clocked a season best of 44.98; Virgin
Islander Tabarie Henry who can easily run a sub-45 and Renny Quow of Trinidad
and Tobago.
James, who
is also expected to move into Sunday's semi-final round, will come up against
Jonathan Borlee of Belgium, William Collazo of Cuba and Bahamian Ramon Miller.
All three have clocked sub-45s as their personal best.
The world
leader over the one-lap distance will be donning his Grenada NOC’s wrist band
in the colours of red, green and gold.
But one
should not overlooked the defending champion American LaShawn Merritt and the
potential of the other Caribbean athletes in Jermaine Gonzales of Jamaica and
Chris Brown and Demetrius Pinder of the Bahamas.
Merritt
returned to competition last month after serving a two-year suspension for
doping violation. He ran an impressive 44.74 seconds to finish second to
Gonzales (44.69) at the DN Galan Diamond League in Stockholm.
Janelle
Redhead, the other Grenadian competitor and lone female, competes in the women’s
200 metres on day six of competition on Thursday.
Meantime, Grenada’s
most celebrated athlete Alleyne Francique has warned his Grenadian counterparts
that they must not take everything for granted and prepare to work hard to
secure medals.
“You have
to know the qualifying procedures, the lane draws, your competitors and don’t
think because you ran 44.61 or 44.65 that you could jog,” said Francique. “Just
go out there and run, just run,” he quipped.
“They are
young and have a lot of competitions ahead of them and stand a good chance of
winning medals,” said Francique, a five-time competitor at the World
Championships.
His main
concern is the athletes’ ability to compete the three rounds over three
consecutive days. “During my time we had a day off to rest after the
semi-finals but now they will be running three consecutive days”. “Hopefully
they could contest the rounds injury-free and if they have a good showing in
the semi-finals then I think they both could do well,” he said.
Overall,
this could be the best outing for Grenada at the World Championships in
Athletics since Francique’s performances in 2001 and 2003 when he was a
finalist and a semifinalist in 2005 and 2007.
The last
World Championships in 2009, all four competitors exited in the first round of
competition.
Click on
link to listen to interview with Alleyne Francique
1 comment:
Very well-written article --I like the build up and the data on Grenada's athelets over time. I/m looking forward to good news! Thank you, Michael Bascombe.
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