Atheltics Weekly

IAAF WORLD CHAMPS 2017
McLEOD MAY THWART MERRITT
110m HURDLES
COULD America’s Aries
Merritt, who underwent a
kidney transplant just days
after his bronze at the World
Championships in 2015,
complete one of the most
remarkable comebacks of
recent years and write a
Event statistics
World record: 12.80
Aries Merritt (USA)
Champs record: 12.91
Colin Jackson (GBR)
Defending champion:
Sergey Shubenkov (RUS)
British interest: David King,
David Omoregie, Andy Pozzi
AW prediction: 1 McLeod (JAM),
2 Merritt (USA), 3 Shubenkov
History: Allen Johnson won four
golds between 1995 and 2003.
He was third in 2005.
ALL THE signs point to this
event coming down to a duel
between an experienced
campaigner and a young
athlete in the midst of making a
significant breakthrough in the
event.
real-life fairytale by hurdling to
gold in London?
The 2012 Olympic champion
and world record-holder, whose
positive demeanour has served
him well in his return to the
The 31-year-old American
Kerron Clement is the reigning
Olympic champion who won
his first world championships
gold back in 2007. He may
be advancing in years but is
showing absolutely no signs
whatsoever of slowing down
and has run the second-fastest
sport, certainly knows how to
win in the UK capital. Though
he wasn’t able to race in Rio,
he is very much back up there
with the elite now after his
health problems.
There is, however, a
substantial and ominouslooking
obstacle standing
in his way in the shape of
Jamaica’s Olympic champion
Omar McLeod, the only man
in the world to have broken 13
seconds this year.
Defending world champion
Sergey Shubenkov (racing
under a neutral flag) will have a
say, too, as could Cuban-born
Spaniard Orlando Ortega – a
silver medallist in Rio.
Throw in the extra dimension
of Britain’s ever-improving
Andy Pozzi racing in front of
and feeding off the partisan
time in the world so far
during 2017.
The man who sits top of
that chart is Kyron McMaster,
a 20-year-old from the British
Virgin Islands who was a world
junior bronze medallist last year
and will be taking part in his first
major championships when he
sets foot on the London track.
Judging by the way he
defeated a top quality field to
run that world-leading 47.80 in
Jamaica back in May, it doesn’t
look like he will be daunted by
the challenge ahead.
Clement’s compatriot
Eric Futch should feature
prominently in the final
reckoning too, while it will
also be worth keeping an eye
out for the talented 21-yearold
Norwegian and former
decathlete Karsten
Warholm.
home crowd – he is joined in
the British line-up by David
Omoregie and David King – and
this really could be one of the
most intriguing events of the
whole championships. EC
THE MASTER v THE YOUNG PRETENDER
400m HURDLES
Omar McLeod:
became Olympic
champion in Rio
Kerron Clement and Kyron McMaster: title
should come from these two athletes
Aries Merritt:
could he defy
the odds to
take the gold?
Event statistics
World record: 46.78
Kevin Young (USA)
Champs record: 47.18 Young
Defending champion:
Nicholas Bett (KEN)
British interest: Jack Green
AW prediction: 1 Clement (USA), 2
McMaster (IVB), 3 Warholm (NOR)
History: The double Olympic
champion Felix Sanchez also won
two world titles plus a silver and
made seven world finals.
This will also be a landmark
occasion for Jack Green,
the Briton who left the sport
temporarily following the 2012
Olympics due to struggles with
depression and injury.
He has, however, coached
himself back to finding some
good form again and was a
thoroughly convincing
winner at the team trials in
Birmingham. EC
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