EUGENE: Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won her record fifth world 100m title in Eugene, Oregon, on Sunday, leading an unprecedented Jamaican cleansweep of the podium.
Fraser-Pryce had an electric start and led from gun to tape at Hayward Field, winning in a championship record of 10.67 seconds.
Shericka Jackson took silver in a personal best of 10.73sec, with four-time Olympic sprint champion Elaine Thompson-Herah claiming bronze (10.81).
It as the first time a nation had swept the medals in the women’s 100m at the worlds and came just a day after Fred Kerley led a US sweep of the men’s blue riband event, albeit for the third time in worlds history.
Olympic great Mo Farah was trafficked to UK, forced to be child servant
Fraser-Pryce is also the first athlete to ever win five gold medals in a track event at the World Championships in the same discipline, with Sunday’s win following 100m golds in 2009, 2013, 2015 and 2019.
Lined up in lane six in perfect sprinting conditions, Fraser-Pryce sported a shock of hair trailing down her back dyed in the green, gold and black colours of the Jamaican flag.
Nicknamed the ‘Pocket Rocket’, the packed stadium could easily see why as the 35-year-old shot out of her blocks and never ceded the lead.
Britain’s Dina Asher-Smith, in lane eight, emerged as the sprinter most likely to wreck Jamaican plans, but Jackson and the Thompson-Herah reeled her in.
Asher-Smith eventually finished fourth, equalling her national record of 10.83sec.
The Jamaican cleansweep is even more remarkable as it mirrors what they managed at last year’s Tokyo Olympics.
In the Japanese capital, it finished with Thompson-Herah taking gold, Fraser-Pryce silver and Jackson bronze.
While Thompson-Herah’s Tokyo triumph brought her individual Olympic tally to four golds, she and Jackson are still both seeking their first individual world titles.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.