Alejandro Parada
Havana, August 24 (RHC) - On Thursday, young Alejandro Parada will be the only Cuban athlete competing in the long jump final at the World Athletics Championships in Budapest, Hungary.
With a jump of 8.13m (+2.5), the 19-year-old Cuban and debutant in adult world championships placed fifth among the 38 jumpers who competed in the qualifying round, led by Jamaican Pinnock (8.54m).
Parada was only 2 cm short of his personal best of 8.15m, achieved this season at the Pan American Stadium in eastern Havana.
The Santiago native is considered a talent in Cuban athletics, and in his short career he has already won the subtitle in last year's U-20 World Championship in Cali, Colombia, and the gold medal in the last Centrocaribes in San Salvador.
In addition to Pinnock, one of the young talents of the specialty, in the final will be the Olympic champion, the Greek Miltiadis Tentoglou, and the winners of the last world championships, Tajay Gayle, also from Jamaica, and the Chinese Wang Jianan, king in Eugene-2022.
The long jump is one of the most awarded specialties of Cuban athletics in outdoor world championships with seven medals and the one that has won the most gold medals (4), all of them by Iván Pedroso.
On Wednesday, Cuban triple jumpers Leyanis Pérez and Liadagmis Povea stood out for Cuba.
Leyanis, fourth in Eugene-2022 and leader of the current Diamond League, flew in her first attempt to 14.50m, while Povea started with a poor jump of 14.05m, but in the second she went to 14.31, one centimeter more than the minimum mark required.
Venezuela's Yulimar Rojas, the queen of the specialty, stretched without setting the maximum in her run to 14.59, while Jamaica's Shanieka Ricketts achieved the best result with 14.67.
The triple jump final will be this Friday.
On the Latin American side, the great winner on Wednesday was the Dominican Marileidy Paulino with her first world title in the 400m, time of 48.76 sec, national record for the Dominican Republic.
The exceptional sprinter trained by the Cuban Yaseen Perez Gomez became the second Latin American queen of the distance, two decades after the Mexican Ana Gabriela Guevara.
After the triumph, La Paulino advanced her desire to beat the world record of the 400 meters, set at 47.60 by Marita Koch since 1985.
Also on the track came a surprise, when Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen fell victim again to a British runner in a world 1500m final.
A year ago in Eugene, the Norwegian underestimated the level of his rivals, including England's Jake Wightman, and came second. At the time he said he was an inferior athlete.
Now fellow Brit Josh Kerr finished him off in the final meters with a time of 3:29.29m, and said "I wasn't feeling 100 percent when it really mattered. I felt that after 500/600m my legs were not what I would like them to be.
Fellow Briton Sebastian Coe, president of World Athletics and one-time 1500m star, was the first to congratulate Kerr and came down the track to present Kerr with the symbolic medal.
In the 400m hurdles final, another great Norwegian star, Karsten Warholm, first with three crowns in that specialty, this time with a time of 46.89 sec, did do justice.
On Thursday, in the first finals of the day, Spain made history.
In the men's 35 km walk, Spain's Alvaro Martin won with a Spanish record of 2h24:30, five days after celebrating his victory in the 20 km.
Ecuador's Brian Daniel Pintado won a valuable bronze medal.
Meanwhile, among the women, Maria Perez, the 35 km world record holder, won the race to repeat her 20 km triumph.
Maria Perez snatched the throne from Peruvian Kimberly Garcia, who finished second.
In addition to the men's long jump final, the finals of the hammer throw (women), 100m hurdles (women), 400m (men) and 400m hurdles (women) will be held this Thursday.
Source: Jit
