Hassan, Obiri lead high-powered clashes in London

The IAAF Diamond League resumes at the Muller Anniversary Games in London on Saturday and Sunday, the series’ only two-day meeting which this year has attracted 20 reigning world and 10 reigning Olympic individual and relay champions to the British capital’s iconic Olympic Stadium.

After her sensational 4:12.33 world record run in the mile in Monaco last Friday, Sifan Hassan will take on world champion Hellen Obiri in a 5000m field that includes two other women who have run faster than 14:30.

800m ace Nijel Amos will also return to the track after his sensational 1:41.89 run in Monaco, the second fastest of his career – behind the 1:41.73 he sped to at the 2012 Olympics on this London track.

Expect a Kenyan armada consisting of Ferguson Rotich (second in Monaco in 1:43.54), Lausanne winner Wyclife Kinyamal (1:43.78 SB) and 2018 sensation Emmanuel Korir (1:44:01 SB) to give chase. Korir clocked his 1:42.05 personal best in London last year.

Faith Kipyegon, the 2016 Olympic and 2017 world champion, made her eagerly anticipated return from maternity leave a successful one with a 3:59.04 win at the Prefontaine Classic 18 days ago.

Her competitors, who’ll include European champion Laura Muir, rising Ethiopian star Gudaf Tsegay, German Konstanze Klosterhalfen and Shanghai Diamond League winner Rababe Arafi, will keep a closer eye on her this time around.

With several of the leading US sprint hurdlers opting to focus on next week’s national championships, the focus in the women’s 100m hurdles will fall on Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan who will return to the track four days after her 12.49 victory in Sotteville les Rouen,a performance that elevated the 22-year-old to third on the season’s list.

Queen Claye of the US, who improved her 2019 best to 12.63 in the northern French city behind Amusan, is also in the field, along with European champion Elvira Herman of Belarus.

The men’s 100m will round out the first day’s action on the Diamond League programme. The favourites include African champion Akani Simbine, Olympic 100m bronze medallist Andre De Grasse and Great Britain’s Zharnel Hughes, the European champion. British fans will also be delighted to see sprinter James Ellington return to the track two and a half years after surviving a serious motorcycle accident.

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