Online Reporter
THE world athletics championships in Tokyo starting today can “wipe away” the painful memory of empty stands at the Olympics there four years ago, the head of Japan’s athletics federation said.
The Tokyo Games, delayed a year to 2021 because of the pandemic, were held in strict conditions to prevent the spread of the virus, with fans shut out of most venues and athletes forced to undergo tests and social distancing.
The world championships will have no such restrictions and thousands of fans are expected to flock to Tokyo’s National Stadium, which seats almost 70 000.
Japan Association of Athletics Federations president Yuko Arimori said yesterday that she hoped the competition would remind people of the value of sport.
“Sport isn’t just about the athletes but about everyone getting energy from it and lifting each other up, and I think that kind of energy is important,” she said.
“I think this event will help us wipe away the emotions we felt back then and remind us what sport should be like.
“Athletics is the mother of sports and I want people to take inspiration from it.”
Arimori, a former marathon runner who won silver at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics and bronze in Atlanta four years later, became emotional as she considered the competition’s meaning.
“I’m so happy that the world’s media, top athletes from around the globe and kids and fans from all over Japan will come to this stadium to support athletics and give us their energy,” said Arimori, she said.
World Athletics president Sebastian Coe said sport had “a unique ability” to bring people together.
“It’s the most potent social worker in all our communities,” he said.
“It does it most effectively, probably more effectively than any other sector.
“It has the ability to touch the hearts and minds and lifestyles of young people in the way very few other sectors do.”
Lyles, Alfred target 100m title
Olympic champions Noah Lyles and Julien Alfred will take to the track today for heats of the 100m.
Lyles will come under pressure from a top Jamaican duo seeking to break US dominance in the blue riband event.
Alfred meanwhile will look to bag another global title for St Lucia, after her Olympic gold the first for the tiny Caribbean Island.
There is no doubt that Lyles and Alfred have touched down in the Japanese capital with targets on their backs.
Although Lyles had a delayed start to the season, both have tasted success on the Diamond League circuit.
Lyles outran Botswana’s Olympic 200m champion Letsile Tebogo in that event in the Diamond League finals in Zurich last month.
It was a result the American said had left him “with a lot of energy” heading to Tokyo.
Alfred also notched up a morale-boosting win over 100m in Zurich and was in no doubt about expectations in Japan.
“I feel like I want to add another gold in my collection,” Alfred said. “I am much fitter than before and also mentally, I am in the right place where I want to be.”
Kishane Thompson, who won Olympic 100m silver just five-thousandths of a second behind Lyles in Paris, could be the biggest threat to the American.
Thompson went sixth in the all-time list after running a world-leading 9.75 seconds this season.
Fellow Jamaican Oblique Seville has also notched up two victories over Lyles in the Diamond League.
Their form left sprint legend Usain Bolt in no doubt over who would top the podium tomorrow.
“There’s no reason they shouldn’t be 1-2 because they are at the top, fastest times in the world this year and they’ve been competing for a while,” said Bolt.
“It’s just about one of them executing and it should be fine.”
Alfred will be targeted by a raft of sprinters from the US and Jamaican squads, not least American Melissa Jefferson-Wooden.
Jefferson-Wooden (24), became the first woman since 2003 to win the 100-200m double at the US trials.
She has a personal best of 10.65 seconds, making her the joint fifth-fastest woman in history and is the world-leading time this year.
“I know that I’m in great shape and that it’s all about putting together the perfect race at the perfect time, when it matters the most, and that is at the world championships in Tokyo,” she said.
Botswana’s Tebogo is seen as the likeliest candidate to gate-crash the US-Jamaican battle in the men’s 100m.
The 22-year-old is a proven competitor over the shorter sprint and can be expected to be in the battle for a podium place.
He accused Lyles of “arrogance” after the 200m Olympic final, but insists he is content not to have chosen the American’s outspoken style.
“For me, I choose to be out of the spotlight and then just my legs do the talking,” Tebogo said in Tokyo.
It may seem odd to mention the name of Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce in the same sentence as the word outsider, but that is certainly the case in her career-closing world champs.
The 38-year-old Jamaican is a five-time world champion over 100m, and in the last worlds in Budapest in 2023 claimed bronze.
Advancing years means Fraser-Pryce will finally hang up her spikes after Tokyo, having spent an incredible 17 years as a dominant force in women’s sprinting.
“I’m looking forward to just finishing the chapter and ending this career in a magnificent way,” said the sprinter who has won three Olympic gold medals and 10 world titles, with a total of 25 Olympic and world medals to her name.
“And I’m sure it’ll work out in Tokyo.”
Another relative outsider is Sha’Carri Richardson, who is the defending world champion but whose life off the track sometimes detracts from her on-field ability. – AFP Sport.
