Shericka Jackson of Jamaica smiles after profitable the ladies’s 200-meter competitors on the Golden Gala Pietro Mennea IAAF Diamond League athletics assembly in Rome, Thursday, June 9, 2022.
Related Press/Andrew Medichini, file
Two-time girls’s world 200 metres champion Shericka Jackson will head the checklist of Caribbean athletes trying to make a robust end when the World Athletics Diamond League will get able to crown its champions on the Prefontaine Traditional in the USA.
Jackson is among the many world’s finest athletes heading to Hayward Discipline within the American metropolis of Eugene trying to finish their seasons on a excessive.
The 29-year-old Jamaican sprinter has set her sights on breaking the ladies’s world 200m report of 21.34 seconds set by American Florence Griffith-Joyner in 1988, and the Diamond League Finals is the ultimate huge stage alternative this yr for her to attempt to break this report. Jackson clocked 21.41 secs to retain her title on the World Championships final month in Budapest. She additionally ran 21.48 on the Diamond League meet not too long ago in Brussels, and is edging nearer and now has three of the 4 quickest instances within the girls’s 200, however she will probably be hoping she has sufficient within the tank to allow her to attain the report along with her right down to race within the girls’s 100 at this meet.
Jackson will line up towards a area that features a number of international medalist Marie-Josee Ta Lou of Ivory Coast, Daryll Neita of Nice Britain, Jenna Prandini of the USA, and Anthonique Strachan of The Bahamas. Danielle Williams, one other two-time world champion, will probably be hoping that she will be able to additionally turn out to be a double Diamond League Finals winner within the girls’s 100 hurdles.
The 31-year-old Jamaican claimed her second world title in Budapest eight years after her first, and she’s going to goal to regain the Diamond League title after her first victory 4 years in the past.
All three world medalists characteristic in one other robust area, with Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico and Kendra Harrison of the USA focusing on their first Diamond League trophy together with American Nia Ali and Nigerian Tobi Amusan.Olympic champion Hansle Parchment of Jamaica will face world champion Grant Holloway of the USA. Parchment, 33, gained the race on the Diamond League meet in Xiamen after Holloway hit the final hurdle. Holloway has had Diamond League wins in Florence, Paris, and London, in addition to the world title. The 2 champions will probably be joined by a area that features American Daniel Roberts, who joined them on the rostrum final month in Budapest. World bronze medalist Sada Williams of Barbados will look to pose a stiff problem within the girls’s 400.
World champion Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic lived as much as expectation to win the one-lap title in Budapest. World silver medalist Natalia Kaczmarek may also hope to spring a shock. The Jamaica pair of Rushell Clayton and Janieve Russell are anticipated to place up a problem towards world champion Femke Bol of the Netherlands within the girls’s 400 hurdles.
Tajay Gayle will probably be trying to construct on his world bronze medal and leap to his first Diamond League title within the males’s lengthy leap, however Simon Ehammer of Switzerland is likely one of the jumpers standing in his means, with solely 5 centimetres splitting the pair on season’s bests.
Natoya Goule-Toppin of Jamaica can be anticipated to place up a problem within the girls’s 800, the place the thrilling alternative of an sudden rematch between international medalists Mary Moraa, Keely Hodgkinson, and Athing Mu will take middle stage.
