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• Gardiner among Olympic champions set to compete at Ostrava Golden Spike

  Bahamian Steven Gardiner is among three individual men’s Olympic sprint champions set to compete at the Golden Spike, a World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meeting in Ostrava on Tuesday.

  Italy’s Marcell Jacobs and Canada’s Andre De Grasse, the Olympic gold medallists over 100m and 200m respectively, will clash over the shorter distance, then De Grasse will double up by contesting his specialist event.

  Gardiner, meanwhile, will take on world indoor champion Alexander Doom over one lap of the track.

  The Bahamian, who has a season’s best of 44.45, could be pushed by the Belgian, who won in Marrakesh last week with a lifetime best of 44.51.

  Not including the few races where he has pulled up injured, Gardiner has been undefeated over 400m since the 2017 World Championships.

  Elsewhere, Jacobs has had just two individual outings this year, the latest being a 10.07 season’s best to win in Rome last weekend.

  That makes the Italian the fastest of the Ostrava field this year on season’s bests, though he’s also one of four men in the line-up with a sub-10-second PB.

  De Grasse, meanwhile, has a best this year of 10.11 and recently finished second at the Diamond League meeting in Marrakesh.

  Britain’s Reece Prescod, who set his PB of 9.93 in Ostrava when winning in the Czech city two years ago, will be one to watch, as will Jamaica’s Ryiem Forde.

  Later in the evening, De Grasse will take on Jamaica’s Andrew Hudson and Britain's Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake in the 200m.

  In the men’s javelin, home favourite Jakub Vadlejch will take on European champion Julian Weber and two-time world champion Anderson Peters.

  Four-time global medallist Vadlejch recently won in Doha with 88.38m, which puts him just one centimeter ahead of Weber on this year’s world list. Peters is close behind with a best of 86.62m.

   

• “Journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step”: Thompson-Herah encouraged despite last-place finish at Prefontaine Classic to open season

  Two-time Olympic sprint double champion Elaine Thompson-Herah had a far from ideal start to her 2024 season at the Prefontaine Classic at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon on Saturday.

  The 31-year-old lined up in the 100m at the fifth meet on this season’s Diamond League calendar and had a race to forget, running 11.30 for a ninth-place finish as hometown hero Sha’Carri Richardson sped away to a season’s best 10.83 for victory.

  “Definitely not what I expected today but grateful,” Thompson-Herah said after the race on Instagram.

  “Journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step,” she added.

  Thompson-Herah, who is now being coached by Reynaldo Walcott at Elite Performance Track Club, is looking to rediscover the form that led her to Olympic glory in 2016 and 2021.

  She endured an injury-riddled 2023 season that saw her fail to make the team for any individual event at the World Championships in Budapest. She did leave those championships with a silver medal, however, as part of the 4x100m quartet.

  Thompson-Herah had much better returns in the second half of the 2023 season.

  She ran times of 10.92 and 10.84 on September 4 and 8 to win at the Gala dei Castelli and the Brussels Diamond League, respectively, before closing out her season with 10.79 for third at the Prefontaine Classic on September 16.

   

   

• Julien Alfred to focus on improvement in lead up to Olympics following second-place finish at Prefontaine Classic

  St Lucia’s sprint sensation, Julien Alfred, has her sights set on refining her technique as she prepares for the upcoming Olympics this summer. Speaking post-race following her second-place finish in the women’s 100m at the Prefontaine Classic Diamond League meeting on Saturday, Alfred outlined her areas of focus.

  Alfred clocked 10.93 seconds in the race, trailing American Sha’Carri Richardson, who won with a world-leading 10.83 seconds. Alfred’s training partner, Dina Asher-Smith, secured third place with a time of 10.98 seconds.

  Reflecting on her performance, the World Indoor 60m champion expressed gratitude and acknowledged the need for improvement. “I’ll take it. I have to give God thanks, nevertheless, that I finished healthy. I did want the win, but I’ll take second for now,” she said.

  Discussing her race strategy, Alfred noted, “I think I got out well. My finish, I think I sort of panicked a little at the end, panicked a little and fighting. I have to work on my ending.”

  Alfred highlighted her progress over time, emphasizing a shift in focus towards better execution. “My strides are wider, I am not as choppy. Right now, I am just focusing on execution. I think before I would go out and just compete, but now it’s just focusing on execution and doing my best to prepare for the Olympics.”

  When asked about what she intends to focus on with Coach Eldrick Floreal, Alfred pinpointed the final segment of her race as a key area for improvement. “The last part of my race. It has always been a struggle of mine where I can really stay upright in the last part of my race but it’s about going back to the drawing board and trying to stay upright the last 40/30m.”

  Julien Alfred’s focus on refining her race finish and execution signals her commitment to achieving peak performance as she prepares for the Olympics. With her impressive second-place finish at the Prefontaine Classic, Alfred has demonstrated her potential to compete at the highest level and her readiness to take on the world’s best this summer.