01.09.2007

Team Australia updates - Day 8

EVENING SESSION

- Again he has failed at 5.91m, his very last jump.
 
Steve Hooker has finished the competition in ninth position with a clearance of 5.76m.

- Hooker missed his first attempt at 5.91m but remarkably has another jump - because he didn’t touch the bar and ran back within his time limit to jump again.
 
- American Brad Walker has jumped to the lead with a 5.86m clearance.

- In the men's 4 x 400m relay, World University Games 400m champion Sean Wroe got Australia off to a sensational start placing the boys in front after the first of four legs.
 
Dylan Grant then took the baton and ran a solid, disciplined leg, passing to Australian All Schools champion Kurt Mulcahy who had the race of his life, overtaking the Jamaicans in the home straight to give Australia a chance of automatically qualifying by finishing in the top three.
 
Running the anchor leg, Mark Ormrod - a member of the silver bullets from Athens 2004 - took off and Australia was looking the goods.
 
With 200m to run the Aussies were third, however, other nations stacked their teams to have their fastest runners running the final leg. Australia was overtaken in the final straight by enough countries to put them out of any chance to run in the final tomorrow night, finishing sixth in a season's best of 3:02.59.

It was our second fastest time at a World Championships.

"As a team, with the late changes we had, I think we did the best we could out there," Wroe said. "This is the world stage, it’s different to the World University Games and it's different again to the Commonwealth Games.
 
"We really need to bring the A-game next year. These guys learnt a lot and as long as they learn for next year, we’ll be right.  
 
"We only found out two hours before the race (that John Steffensen wasn't running). We gave it out all and that’s all we could ask for." 
 
It was an important experience for youngster Kurt Mulcahy.

"It’s a big step up (from All Schools), the crowd was absolutely massive out there tonight," he said. "I basically came to world champs for the experience for future years and I definitely got that experience. It just goes so quick. I was watching Sean run the first leg, then all of a sudden I was out there getting the baton. I hit the 200m mark before I even knew it.
 
"I saw Jamaica come up and basically get the baton at the same time. Then he came and passed me and I just tried to sit in behind him and come home at the end, which I think I did pretty well. I was happy with my run overall, but it's just getting the experience and I’m stoked with that - can’t ask for anything more.
 
"It's been a big experience for me," added Grant. "Uni games was my first major final. We are a big chance to run fast next year. This is only my second big champs and Kurt’s first, so hopefully everything will come together next year and we’ll have a good team."
 
For experienced relay runner Mark Ormrod, Steffensen's replacement, there was some frustration.
 
"I got myself into a position where I am not running as fast as I want to be running," he said. "I shouldn’t be as indecisive.
 
"I’ve done a lot of different stuff in the last year. I’ve moved to the AIS. The training regime has changed and stepped up a gear, it's just not transferring over to the track."  

- Steve Hooker has missed his first attempt at 5.86m.

- Steve Hooker has cleared his second jump at 5.76m. He passed on 5.66m.

- Nagai Stadium is at close to capacity tonight; about 75,000 spectators are in attendance.

- John Steffensen has been forced to withdraw from the men's 4 x 400 relay tonight. The line-up is now Sean Wroe, Dylan Grant, Kurt Mulcahy and Mark Ormrod.

- Eleven vaulters are over at 5.56m.

- Steve Hooker has easily cleared his opening height of 5.51m in the men's pole vault final. American Brad Walker followed suit.

- Kurt Fearnley is the new 1500m wheelchair champion.

After a slow, tactical start, Australia's Kurt Fearnley has won the 1500m wheelchair exhibition event in a time of 3:26.30. Japan's Soejima Masazumi was second in 3:26.62.

The strength of the 26 year-old was too much in the home straight, powering home to victory.

"It was a bit of a tactical affair, my coach Andrew and I sat down and for the last week have been playing out scenarios in how it would run and we were 80 percent sure it would run exactly that way," he said. "For the last three months we have pretty much been training for a race to run like that.
 
"The plan was to stay relaxed until the last 150m, then kick home and it just ran out perfectly.
 
"I stopped doing marathon training from the first day of April and it's been nothing but shorter distances and it's been nothing but power and working on my top end speed.  
 
"From here on in, it's back out on the road and back to doing 30-40km pushes each day. This is a nice way to finish the sprint season.
 
"Plans are to go home for two to three weeks and I get about a day-and-a-half off, then training in the lead up to Chicago Marathon and definitely New York - that’s the race that I love and I’ll be there."

Fearnley has an amazing range of events, competing from 400m right through to marathon.

MORNING SESSION

- Nathan Deakes is the world champion!

He led by 130m coming into the stadium and began to cry. He put both hands in the air 15m out from the finish and clocked 3:43.53 to claim gold.

A gallant victor then embraced the other medalists and coach at the finish before getting hold of an Australian flag and heading around the track to celebrate.
 
- Deakes' lead has been cut slightly to 1.02 at the 45km mark.
 
Australia's other competitor Chris Erickson was in 26th position at the 40km mark.
 
There's only 34 left in it after 54 started...

- Nathan Deakes is on track to win Australia’s second gold medal at Osaka 2007.

With 8km to go, he now has a lead of 59 seconds over Yohan Diniz (FRA).
 
The 30 year-old has received one caution, so Australia anxiously waits as Deakes closes in on history.

- At the 40km intermediate, Deakes' time was 2:59.05.

- Deakes is 39 seconds ahead of France's Yohan Diniz.

- Nathan Deakes is powering ahead in the men's 50km, his momentum unmatched by any of the other competitors.

- The women's 4 x 100m relay team has finished in eighth position in its heat in a time of 43.91. The time was down on the 43.62 posted in Osaka in May to qualify for this event.

Today Sally McLellan, Melanie Kleeberg, Crystal Attenborough and Fiona Cullen ran - in that order.

Australia was let down by a couple of its baton changes, lacking the fluency of the men's team that performed solidly last night.

"(We're) very disappointed," Cullen said. "Coming into it, we have had the best preparation I think any Australian women’s relay team has had in many years. We are a true team.
 
"We have worked together brilliantly, we have combined together brilliantly.
 
"Honestly, until we see the footage, I don’t know what happened there today.  
 
"We put our marks down conservatively, the job today was to get the baton around and qualify for Beijing and the final. We knew that we were good enough to do that.
 
"That’s relays, so many things can go wrong and so many things can go right.
 
"I guess we are all extremely disappointed. Simply because that first change has been one of the best in training. So, as I said, I don’t what happene, but all you can do is do the best you can.
 
"When you are chasing down the likes of Kim Gevaert and Christine Arron it’s a tough ask.
 
"We threw everything we had at it and it just didn’t come good on the day. We’ve just got to take that and learn from it.
 
"We need to run 43.90 or better (for Beijing)."
 
That was also acknowledged by Attenborough.

"The main goal was to qualify for the Olympics," she said. "We will have to go back and talk to Cliff (Mallett) and Paul (Hallam) and see how that time fits in with everything. We were .01 outside of the qualifying time.  We don’t know where that leaves us. If it is not a qualifier, we have to chase one which is really hard in Australia, to get to other countries plus get it sanctioned. It would have been great and a lot easier here. It didn’t go to plan, but that’s the way it happens.
 
"This is honestly one of the most perfect days in the stadium," Cullen added. "The sun was out, there was a little breeze about. That track makes you feel like a god, honestly! It is just one of the best tracks I have ever stepped foot on and had the privilege of running on. I just felt sublime and know all the other girls did too.
 
"It's just disappointing that we weren’t able to show the Australian public what we are made of. We’ve qualified Australia before and we’ll do it again. The most important thing to remember now is that we are a team and the whole team is responsible for the result. There is no one or two people that the blame goes on, there is no blame whatsoever in this team. It's our result and we’ll stand by it and it’s up to us to run better."

- Nathan Deakes has made his move, soon after the 30km mark of the men's 50km walk.

Chris Erickson was in 25th position at the 30km mark.

Unfortunately, Duane Cousins has been disqualified.

Men’s 50km walk

At 8am AEST today Australia’s world record holding walker Nathan Deakes took to the streets surrounding Nagai Stadium to attempt to take his first ever World Championships title. Dual Commonwealth champion from both Melbourne and Manchester and Olympic bronze medallist from Athens, Deakes will be the man to beat.

Fellow Aussie Duane Cousins, a seasoned campaigner, will be looking to atone for his disqualification at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games and Chris Erickson, bronze medallist over this distance in Melbourne and the youngest of the Australian contingent, will also be in the hunt.
 
Out to spoil the world record holder’s party will be Russian Denis Nizhegorodov, whose best time of 3:35.29 is under Deakes' world record. As there was no drug test taken at the time, the record was not ratified. He comes into this competition with a season best of 3:40.53 recorded at Cheboksary, the same place as his world beating time from 2004, and looks to be the biggest danger for Deakes.

Also in the hunt will be Italy’s Alex Schwazer who recorded a personal best of 3:36.04 earlier this season in Rosignana Solvay. Both he and Deakes will cope better with the heat than Nizhegorodov and compatriots Kirdyapkin and Kanaykin, but as we saw in the women’s walk yesterday the Russians are outstanding competitors and will definitely be in the race.

Nathan Deakes has all it will take to win this race at his disposal, but the technicalities of championship racing have taken many a casualty before, so let's cross our fingers and hope that the walking gods are smiling on him.

Women’s 4 x 100m relay heats

Can Sally McLellan, one of the darlings of the championships, lead her teammates through what is a pretty competitive heat in the women’s 4 x 100m relay? She will be joined on the track by fellow Queenslander Fiona Cullen, the Northern Territory’s Crystal Attenborough, Tasmanian Melissa Kay and Melanie Kleeberg from the ACT – in what is a relay team that spans a nation.

Coming up against the well-performed Russian, French and the Belarusian units, the Aussie girls will have to bring their A-game to make the final. The Chinese, Finnish and the Brazilians also look to be strong contenders.
 
Heat two looks even tougher, featuring the strongly favoured team USA and the well performed German, Jamaican and British teams.

Men’s 1500m wheelchair

The exhibition event for these championships will be the exciting and highly competitive 1500m wheelchair events for both men and women. Whilst Australia will not be represented in the women’s event, Kurt Fearnley enters the men’s event as one of the favourites. As a seasoned and much decorated competitor on the road and track– Paralympic and IPC champion in both the 5000m and marathon events - he will be a serious contender, though the 1500m distance might be a bit short for his liking. With Weir and Mendoza Hernandez out due to illness and injury respectively, Swiss competitor Marcel Hug will pose the greatest threat.

Men’s pole vault final

Perth-based Commonwealth champion Steve Hooker will come out to play tonight in the final of the men’s pole vault. He is confident, in great form and has had a consistent lead-up and this title is his for the taking - at least that’s how Hooker sees it.

Not that he will have it all his way. There are two six-metre men in the field, a mark that Hooker is yet to reach; German Danny Ecker and American Brad Walker, who defeated Hooker at both outings in Australia during the domestic season and has the highest jump this year.

You can throw a blanket over Otto, Ecker, Walker and Hooker, all of whom have jumped within 7cm of each other this year and have personal bests of 5.90m or more. They are the stand-outs in a quality field. The result will have everything to do with the conditions on the day, who best manages the heat and who can handle the pressure. Because, rest assured, it will be on.
  
Men’s 4 x 400m relay heats

In heat one at 10pm AEST tonight John Steffensen and Sean Wroe will step onto the championships stage once more to lead their fellow Aussies in an extremely competitive heat of the 4 x 400m relay. Coming up against the speedsters from the Bahamas and Jamaica, the good news is that Team USA is in heat two it will still take a great run from Steffensen, Wroe, Mark Ormrod, Kurt Mulcahy and Dylan Grant (final four to be advised) to make it though to Sunday night’s final, which is the final event here in Osaka.

Women’s 4 x 100m relay final

If the Aussie girls make it through this morning's heats they will line up in the final eight at 11:05pm AEST.