African Championships

[pherekydes]

Starts tomorrow, Wednesday, in Addis Ababa. As you probably know, AA is at about 2300m.

Obviously, the distance events will be loaded, but times will be affected. In the sprints, on the other hand, Fasuba is attending. What chances a really fast time in the 100m?

What will the weather be like?

[carfu]

Wednesday afternoon, just before the start of the afternoon session. It's raining a lot. Don't know how long it will last.

The problems with the sprints is head wind. This morning there were a few races with -2, -3m/s.

[tandfman]

It appears that the weekend weather will be foul. Cool and rainy.

http://www.wunderground.com/global/stations/63450.html

[Jon]

Results here: http://www.addis2008.org/Results/Data/at/indexframe.htm

The afternoon session of day 1 has just got under way.

[tandfman]

What they are calling the afternoon session is (at least today) actually sort of an evening session. It started at 5:10 pm local time (which is 7 hours ahead of US Eastern daylight time).

[stallion]

Kenenisa Bekele withdrew from the 10000 beforehand without explanation.
The Ethiopians swept the event anyway, led by Gebremariam in 28:17.

[tandfman]

Kenenisa Bekele withdrew from the 10000 beforehand without explanation.
The Ethiopians swept the event anyway, led by Gebremariam in 28:17.

Just curious. Where did you get that info? It doesn't seem to be posted on the site that Jon linked to.

[joeltetreault]

Kenenisa Bekele withdrew from the 10000 beforehand without explanation.
The Ethiopians swept the event anyway, led by Gebremariam in 28:17.

Just curious. Where did you get that info? It doesn't seem to be posted on the site that Jon linked to.

Top 3 results of the 10000m here:
http://www.addis2008.org/News/NewsManag ... 6469781893

Bekele withdrew from the 10000 because he didn't feel ready after the WXC champs:

http://www.iaaf.org/news/kind=100/newsid=44632.html

[stallion]

Kenenisa Bekele withdrew from the 10000 beforehand without explanation.
The Ethiopians swept the event anyway, led by Gebremariam in 28:17.

Just curious. Where did you get that info? It doesn't seem to be posted on the site that Jon linked to.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/more/04/30/ethiopian.african.race.ap/

[doug091463]

anyone notice the fastest ethiopian girl in the 400 did not qualify running 58.09, i would think t. dibaba or defar could run faster and they are 10k/5k runners (who might be the best 1500 girls in the world if they wanted to) but this has long puzzled me. in the usa some would say the distance runners are the rejects who cant sprint. i wonder if ethiopia is the opposite sprinters are just runners who are not good at distance.

[AS]

Re: African Championships

Obviously, the distance events will be loaded, but times will be affected. In the sprints, on the other hand, Fasuba is attending. What chances a really fast time in the 100m?

Fasuba has some improving to do after being 19th-fastest qualifier in the 100m first round (10.62)....

Oh, he did... fastest qualifier from Semis in 10.27:

1. 350 Olusoji FASUBA 10.27 Q
2. 354 Emedolu UCHENNE 10.36 Q
2. 472 Hannes DREYER 10.36 Q
4. 858 Idrissa SANOU 10.38 Q
5. 759 Aziz OUHADI 10.40 Q
6. 118 Amr Ibrahim MOUSTAFA 10.40 q
7. 312 Kaanjka HITJIVIRUE 10.40 q
8. 142 Wilfried BINGANGOYE 10.48 Q

[Jon]

Melkamu beats Defar in the 5000m!

http://www.addis2008.org/Results/Data/a ... 04001.html

Defar was almost beaten into third - Grace Momanyi (an up-and-coming Kenyan who looks set to be a threat this year) recorded the same time as Defar.

First time since September 2006 that Defar has been beaten on the track.

[stallion]

http://www.iaaf.org/news/kind=100/newsid=44645.html

Defar says she was ill and competed because "I made a promise to my people."

[nevetsllim]

I think this Nachula girl might be something big in the future. She's only 18 and lowered the Zambian record by almost one-second from 52.97 to 51.99 in the semi-finals.

In 2006, she competed at the Commonwealth Games at 200m and 400m and at the last African Champs in 2006, she ran in the 800m and the 1500m!!

Good run by Montsho in the 2nd semi-final, close to sub-51sec.

[MDC]

I was amongst Meseret's people last night -- the crowd was thunderous from the moment the entrants came through the tunnel and into the stadium until well after the race was over. Only on the last lap did the first of the three Kenyans drop off the pace, while the remaining two Kenyans and the three Ethiopians sorted themselves out through the last 200 meters.

The weather was perfect, the crowd shouted, danced, sang, and stomped their feet throughout the race. When Meselech took her victory lap, the crowd continued to roar while making torches out of paper -- yes, ducking ashes and embers is always a treat. When Meseret later took a lap to show her appreciation of the crowd, it was clear that she was hurting, and not just from the race.

As to the weather in Addis, it appears we'll have afternoon clouds with chances of sporadic rains . . . a downpour on Wednesday night dropped the temps for the men's 10,000 and a little drizzle on Thursday (a national holiday, Labor Day, btw) didn't make much difference before the events started. No rain during the meet at all.

If the stadium could have held another 10,000, those held outside would have been there, too. Sadly, we have the typical IAAF "reserved" seats for those phantom people -- the juxtaposition of an relatively empty homestretch to the middle of the first curve and an overcrowded stadium explains how the IAAF still just doesn't "get it" sometimes -- yet let me quickly add how grateful I am that this meet was awarded to Addis Ababa for the first time. The Ethiopians are thrilled to be hosting this meet, and I was asked many times "how I see the stadium" compared to others in the US and Europe. The renovations since even the Ethiopian Championships four weeks ago are great, especially the warm-up track. Although the crowd lacks "big meet" experience, especially with the technical events, they love their athletics.

One more aside. You cannot overstate the contribution that the female runners have made in the area of gender issues. They each are seen as role models, as inspiration, and ambassadors of their country -- and both the men and women are investing to help their country rise from their poverty.

And still three more great days of track and field ahead.