Sanya Richards-Ross in top-form to defend her World Championships title – Athletics news
Sanya Richards-Ross, the 26-year-old American 400m runner, has marked an impressive comeback at London where she improved her previous season’s best by about a second. Richards-Ross, marred by injuries, had to stay out of the game this entire season and
now, with the World Championships just around the corner, there had been serious doubts over her form and fitness to be able to defend her title in the big tournament.
Running at London’s Crystal Palace (Aviva London Grand Prix), the American clocked an impressive 49.66 seconds, a whole second better than her last season’s best of 50.61 seconds. This performance was one that none of her spectators were expecting of her.
However, now, when she has ensured of her fitness all over again, she will definitely be a favourite for the 400m run in the World Championships at Daegu, to commence on August 27.
Resolved to defend her title in South Korea, Richards-Ross, who was happy on clocking a sub-50 effort, commented on her run by saying, “It’s been a long, hard season for me and I haven’t really been able to get my rhythm and run sub-50 seconds so to do it
here on a great card in Britain just before Daegu really means a lot to me. It’s taken longer than I thought to put things together, but now I feel ready to defend my title in Daegu.”
However, not all went good for everyone in the run as Christine Ohuruogu, the 27-year-old English athlete, could not display a performance she was expected to show ahead of the run. Sharing her disappointment and accepting the fact that the meeting had actually
exposed her weaknesses to her, she said, “I’m not going to lie, I am really disappointed with that. It was very tough and not what I expected at all. I felt a lot better than I had done but these type of races expose your weaknesses and I just haven’t got
enough in my legs.”
Comparing herself to other female runners of her discipline, the gold medallist of the Beijing Games said that other girls were touching the peak of their forms, while she was a bit behind. However, to her, it was not a big deal as she was determined to
fix the issues well ahead of the Daegu competition. Although three weeks (world championships to go) do not seem enough, she is confident of her experience and the level of expertise she had acquired of her game.
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