Pearson Third at Birmingham Diamond League

Sally Pearson (Qld) has earned a podium finish at the IAAF Diamond League meeting in Birmingham (UK) overnight, finishing third in the women’s 100m hurdles.

If Pearson’s disqualification for a false start earlier in the week at the Stockholm Diamond League event was on her mind, it didn’t show.  Pearson led through the first seven hurdles after another of her trademark fast starts, but was overhauled by eventual winner Dawn Harper-Nelson (USA) and second-place getter Queen Harrison (USA) in the closing stages of the race.

Harper-Nelson clocked a time of 12.66 seconds (wind: +0.2) to cross the line first, with Harrison second in 12.70 and Pearson stopping the clock at 12.85.

In the men’s discus Benn Harradine (Qld) opened the competition with a throw of 54.71m, before improving to 60.43m in round two.  Harradine continued to improve as he recorded a throw of 62.23m with his next attempt, and at the end of three rounds he sat in sixth place overall.

Harradine fouled his next three attempts however and was unable to improve on his third round throw, finishing in sixth position with a best distance of 62.23m.  The event was won by 2014 world number two Robert Harting of Germany with his final throw of 67.57m

Kathryn Mitchell (Vic) was competing in the women’s javelin in Birmingham and opened the competition with a throw of 59.36m. Despite fouling her second and third attempts, that was still good enough to rank her in sixth place after three rounds.

Mitchell also fouled her fourth round effort before she reached 57.67m with her fifth attempt and 58.24m on her final throw. She remained in sixth place behind Elizabeth Gleadale’s (Canada) winning throw of 64.49m at the competition’s end.

Genevieve LaCaze (Qld) raced over the non-standard distance of 2 Miles in Birmingham, crossing the line in a time of 9:52.21 for 14th place behind Mercy Cherono’s (Kenya) new world leading time  of 9:11.49.

In the women’s Pole Vault Alana Boyd (Qld) couldn’t recapture the form that saw her win the Commonwealth title in Glasgow a few weeks ago. Boyd was unsuccessful on all three of her attempts at the opening height of 4.32m and registered a ‘No Height’. Boyd was in good company however as the number one ranked women’s pole vaulter in the world this year, Fabiana Murer of Brazil, also failed to get over the opening height as Katerina Stefanidi of Greece cleared 4.57m to win.

To view the results from the IAAF Diamond League meet in Birmingham click here.