Kenya’s Beatrice Chepkoech smashed the 3,000m steeplechase world record on a night of impressive performances at the Diamond League meeting in Monaco.
The 27-year-old ran eight minutes 44.33 seconds to beat the 8:52.78 set by Bahrain’s Ruth Jebet two years ago.On Friday, Olympic champion Jebet was named among more than 100 athletes and coaches facing disciplinary action for alleged doping offences.
“I am so grateful,” said new world record holder Chepkoech. “I said from the beginning, from the first lap, and I was watching the time, and I knew I was going to break the world record.”
Once pacemaker Caroline Tuigone dropped out Chepkoech – who was fourth behind Jebet at the 2016 Olympics – maintained a strong pace to beat her previous best over the distance by just over 15 seconds. Chris O’Hare broke the Scottish record in a 1500m won by Kenya’s Timothy Cheruiyot in a world lead of 3:28.41. O’Hare’s Scottish record of 3:32.11 means he moves to sixth on the all-time UK list while fellow Scot Jake Wightman improved his best by 0.21 seconds to 3:33.96.
Rising sprint star Noah Lyles kept his unbeaten record with victory over world champion Ramil Guliyev of Turkey in the 200m. Lyles, who turned 21 on Wednesday, pulled away from the field as he ran a lifetime best, world lead and meeting record of 19.65secs, which leaves him as the fastest man so far this year over both 100m and 200m.
In the women’s 400m, Olympic champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo of the Bahamas improved her personal best and set a new world lead of 48.97secs, holding off the challenge of Bahrain’s Salwa Eid Naser. Miller-Uibo’s performance means she becomes the 10th woman in history to go under the 49-second mark. South African Caster Semenya extended her unbeaten run in the 800m to 38 races with a meeting record of 1:54.60.
It looked like a world record could be on the cards for Semenya after a strong first 200m allowed her pull away from the rest of the field. But although she comfortably maintained her advantage, Jarmila Kratochvilova’s 1:53.28 remained out of her reach.
Meanwhile The Great Britain women’s 4x400m relay team from the 2008 Beijing Olympics will receive their bronze medals at Saturday’s Anniversary Games.The quartet of Christine Ohuruogu, Kelly Sotherton, Marilyn Okoro and Nicola Sanders finished fifth in the final at the Bird’s Nest in China.But the team were promoted to fourth when Russia were disqualified after samples were reanalysed in 2016. They moved up again when Belarus’ Sviatlana Usovich tested positive.
“To have a podium experience 10 years on obviously isn’t ideal,” said Sotherton, who is also waiting to receive her heptathlon bronze medal after Ukrainian Lyudmila Blonska and Russia’s Tatyana Chernova were disqualified.”But I am overwhelmed that we all get to stand in an Olympic Stadium in front of a British crowd to receive something that vindicates our performance.I finally feel satisfied we got what the team deserved. To run the time we did and not medal and finish fifth was hard.”
The recently-retired Ohuruogu, who won the 400m individual title at the same Games, added: “Hearing the news that we are to receive our bronze medals stirs up a series of emotions.
“Of course I am happy that we are finally getting the reward and recognition that our performance on the day deserved, but there is still some frustration that we never had ‘our moment’ at the time, and that it has taken 10 years to get to this stage.
“However, I look forward to sharing the podium with the other girls at the Anniversary Games and hope that everybody in my team who helped me get to that point also shares a sense of pride in the achievement and feels vindicated for all the work.”
Several athletes – including Jessica Ennis-Hill – received reallocated Olympic and World Championship medals during last year’s World Athletics Championships and Anniversary Games.