The Birmingham Diamond League on Sunday (5th) was the stage where the wings of three hot favorites were clipped as the winning streak of two came to an end.
In the women’s shot put, 2014 IAAF World Athlete of the Year Valerie Adams of New Zealand was looking to build on her consistent form that saw her take the win in Rome, but the crowd witnessed instead her defeat by American Tia Brooks.
The winner in Doha, Brooks produced a personal best in the fourth round of 19.73m to secure another 10 points in the Diamond Race, with Adams finishing 10cm behind.
However, the defeat of Adams was far from the biggest shock of the day that came in the women’s triple jump as Kazakhstan’s Olga Rypakova put an end to Caterine Ibargüen’s winning streak of 34.
Ibargüen (in photo) was leading with 14.56m until the final round, the jumpers having to deal with distracting swirling winds, but a last attempt from Rypakova gave her the lead with 14.61m.
In the past, Ibargüen has been impressive at responding to situations like this, bouncing back; however, the Colombian’s last attempt of 14.53m was not enough to stop her winning streak coming to an end.
Ironically, almost four years ago, it was Rypakova who inflicted the last defeat on Ibargüen in the London 2012 Olympic final, when the pair took the gold and silver medals, respectively.
Later in the sandpit, long jump world leader Marquise Goodwin of the USA ended another impressive winning streak.
Great Britain’s 2012 Olympic champion Greg Rutherford had gone unbeaten for almost a year; his last loss was in the IAAF Diamond League meeting in London last July. He had won nine straight competitions since the 2015 London Anniversary Games. But after a couple of slightly lack-luster competitions in Rabat and Rome, being beaten by Rutherford in the latter meeting, Goodwin was close to his best.
Coached by four-time World champion Dwight Phillips, Goodwin leapt to an impressive 8.42m in his second round effort, just three centimeters short of his 8.45m world-leading mark, to not only seal the victory over Britain’s reigning world, European and Olympic champion, but also to steal the stadium record off him. Rutherford finished in fifth place with a best of 8.17m.
-Excerpt from Michelle Sammet’s IAAF report