Jamaica’s Tiffany James continued her unbeaten streak at the ongoing IAAF World Junior Championships in Poland where she raced to a Personal Best (PB) of 51.77s to win Heat 3 of the women’s semis with the fastest overall time on Wednesday.
The 19-year old returned a time of 52.98s to win Heat 4 in the preliminaries the previous day, also running the quickest time overall on Day 1. However she took her performance a notch higher in the semis where she controlled the race with 50m to go, inspiring Canada’s Natasha McDonald to a lifetime best of 53.06s to finish 2nd.
USA’s Lynna Irby also impressed as she dominated Heat 1 with a Season’s Best (SB) of 51.90s, while the next four athletes who followed her set PBs. They are Cuba’s Roxana Gómez (52.26s), Dzhois Koba of Ukraine (52.79s), Great Britain’s Hannah Williams (52.80s) and Canadian Ashlan Best (53.27s).
Another Jamaican athlete Junelle Bromfield set the pace in Heat 2 but was unable to maintain her momentum, losing the lead to Canada’s Jessica Thornton who set a PB of 52.12s to cross the finishing line 1st. Bromfield followed in 52.18s, as Kenya’s Maureen Nyatichi Thomas qualified for the final as one of the fastest losers, coming in 3rd in 52.52s.
