Shelly, Shericka headline J’cans in Diamond League
World Athletics Championships gold medallists Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Shericka Jackson will be among a number of Jamaicans scheduled to compete at the Silesia Kamila Skolimowska Memorial in Poland today, the first Diamond League meeting ever to be held in that European country.
Fraser-Pryce will contest the women’s 100m and Jackson will run the 200m; World Championships relay medallists Stephenie Ann McPherson and Candice McLeod will take part in the women’s 400m; and 100m semi-finalist Ackeem Blake is to make his Diamond League debut.
The meet is expected to be exciting after the organisers reported that “49 World Championships medallists will take part, including 19 who took gold”.
Fraser Pryce, the world leader in the women’s 100m and who has run 10.67 seconds three times so far this year, is to be joined by World Championships relay silver medallist Briana Williams and Natasha Morrison. They are to take on Twanisha Terry who anchored the USA team to gold in the 4x100m relay, Marie-Jose TaLou of the Ivory Coast and another American Alia Hobbs.
Fraser-Pryce is no stranger to the event after she set the meeting record of 10.81 seconds last year.
Jackson, who smashed the national record and World Championships record in the 200m, will line up against Shaunae Miller-Uibo, the 400m winner from Eugene; American Jenna Prandini; and her compatriot Gabrielle Thomas who is coming back from an injury and TyNia Gaither of the Bahamas.
The youthful Blake will be, in the Jamaican parlance ‘getting his feet wet’, as he faces a line up that includes three of the top four men in the 100m from the World Championships, Americans Trayvon Bromell, Christian Coleman, and Marvin Bracy as well as South Africa’s Akane Simbine and compatriot Yohan Blake.
Fresh from her silver medal winning performance at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, Danniel Thomas-Dodd will go after Diamond League points and will face a tough field.
World Champion Chase Ealey of the USA, Holland’s Jessica Schilder who won the bronze and Canadian Sarah Mitton, who won the gold in Birmingham earlier this week after just missing a medal in Eugene, will be the top contenders.
McPherson and McLeod, who have made it to the last two major finals in the women’s 400m, will take on 400m hurdles specialist Femke Bol of Holland, Mixed 4x400m relays gold medallist Fiordaliza Cofil of the Dominican Republic and Anna Kielbasinska of Poland.