Allyson Felix Tears Hamstring in 200 Meters, On one side of the track in Luzhniki Stadium, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce was celebrating her first major 200-meter victory with the Jamaican flag in hand and the Bob Marley song “Three Little Birds” playing over the loudspeakers.
“Don’t worry about a thing,” the song went. “'Cause every little thing gonna be all right. Don’t worry about a thing. ‘Cause every little thing gonna be all right.”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the track, Allyson Felix, Fraser-Pryce’s American rival, had plenty of worries as she sat glumly on a gurney being wheeled out of the stadium.
The 200 has long been Felix’s race: she has won three world titles at the distance and finally won the Olympic 200 title last year in London. If she would have prevailed Friday, she would have become the career leader at the world track and field championships with nine gold medals: one ahead of her American predecessors Carl Lewis and Michael Johnson.
But there would be no breaking the tie on an otherwise lovely evening in Moscow. Deep into the curve, as the formidable opposition accelerated, Felix, the most graceful of sprinters, suddenly began to look awkward on her feet. She lost her rhythm, grimaced, then slowed painfully to a hobble, dropping to the blue track with more than half the race left. She landed on her left side, grabbing at her upper right leg.
USA Track & Field later announced that Felix had a tear in her medial right hamstring.
Felix, a willowy 27-year-old, is not built like most sprinters, something she expressed pride in this week as she discussed her ability to show women of all shapes and sizes that sprinting success is within their reach. But she has perhaps never looked as fragile as she did lying in the curve waiting for help.
Medical personnel soon arrived, and her brother and agent, Wes Felix, carried her off the track in his arms.
It was one of the memorable scenes of these championships, and as Felix exited the stage with presumably little chance of participating in the relays this weekend, the three medalists were understandably enjoying their success.
Fraser-Pryce, the short and powerful Jamaican, crossed the line first in 22.17 seconds, followed by Murielle Ahouré of Ivory Coast in 22.32 and Blessing Okagbare of Nigeria in 22.32.
Those times were well off Felix’s career best of 21.69, but this post-Olympic year is now officially a year to forget for Felix.
“I’m extremely devastated,” Felix said in a statement. “I was really hoping to go out there and put together a great race. Now I am consulting with doctors to figure out what is going on with my right hamstring. It is a serious injury, but I don’t know exactly to what extent. I wish all my teammates the best for the rest of the meet.”
Fraser-Pryce, the 26-year-old known for good reason as the Pocket Rocket, now has her first sprint double at a global championship. She won the 100 at the last two Olympics and had already won the 100 in Moscow, giving her two world titles at that distance, as well.
But this was her first victory in the 200; she finished second to Felix in London last year.
“It’s so unfortunate that this happened,” Fraser-Pryce said of Felix’s injury. “We pray that she will be healthy soon.”
Ahouré, a cosmopolitan 25-year-old polyglot, has lived in France and now lives in Houston after attending the University of Miami. But she continues to represent Ivory Coast, the country of her birth, and spoke eloquently last week after winning silver in the 100 about the importance of giving African women athletic role models.
They had another one last night in Okagbare, a triple threat and imposing presence. She had already finished second here in the long jump and sixth in the 100. Okagbare also has strong American connections as a star at Texas- El Paso.
It was a night for serial achievement, with Mo Farah, one of Britain’s luminaries at the Olympics last year in London, becoming the second man to complete a remarkable double-double by winning the 5,000 and 10,000 at both an Olympics and a world championships.
Kenenisa Bekele, the Ethiopian star, was the first to manage it, and Farah managed it Friday only after holding off a series of ferocious attacks in the final 300 meters of the 5,000 from Isiah Kiplangat Koech of Kenya.
“We Kenyans planned with our team to run the race together, but at the end I ran my own race,” Koech said.
Teeth bared and eyes wide, which is fast becoming a trademark, Farah completed the final lap in 53 seconds to win in 13 minutes 26.98 seconds. Hagos Gebrhiwet of Ethiopia was in second in 13:27.26 after he passed the slowing Koech just before the finish.
Bernard Lagat, the 38-year-old American sporting a beard this year, was sixth after winning gold in the event in 2007 and silver in 2009 and 2011.
It remains a mystery why Farah’s opposition, well aware of his phenomenal kick, continues to leave him relatively fresh for a final push. But racing Farah in any type of race these days is a conundrum, and he plans to move up in distance and run the marathon next year.
“Of course I felt tired after the 10,000; that’s why it was a little bit difficult to go faster from the beginning,” Farah said. “I wanted to run as easy as possible today. I thought that the Kenyans would work as a team and might want to box me in, but it didn’t happen. I was able to go in front and control the race.”
Farah was awarded his gold medal by Sebastian Coe, the former British middle-distance star who was head of the organizing committee for last year’s Olympics in London and is now suggesting that Farah deserves to be considered the greatest British track and field athlete in history.
That is quite a statement, considering that Farah has yet to set a world record. But he has certainly been a formidable medal collector and has perhaps the widest range of any runner on the planet at the moment. (He ran a remarkable 3:28.81 in the 1,500 in Monaco this season.)
“This double was definitely tougher than the Olympic one, because last year nobody knew what I was capable of,” Farah said. “Today was indeed one of the most important days in my career, but I’m the same old guy. I loved Moscow. The atmosphere here is great.”
That is certainly debatable. No session has yet been a sellout, and though the crowds have improved at night this week, there were still two big blocks of empty seats as Usain Bolt returned to the track for the 200 semifinals Friday, qualifying for Saturday’s final.
Other winners on Friday David Storl of Germany with 21.73 meters in the men’s shot put and LaShawn Merritt and the United States with a comfortable victory in the men’s 4x400 relay in 2:58.71 seconds.
Dwight Phillips, the 35-year-old American, could do no better than 11th in what he said was his final major long-jump competition. Phillips won the Olympic title in 2004 and won four world championships, in 2003, 2005, 2009 and 2011.
But this title went Aleksandr Menkov of Russia, who won with a leap of 8.56 meters, the best in the world in four years.
It was a fine night for the Russians. Tatyana Lisenko also won the women’s hammer with a championship record throw of 78.80 meters.
Russia’s biggest track and field star, Yelena Isinbayeva, was engaged in damage control, attempting to calm the furor she generated at a news conference Thursday with her comments about homosexuality in Russia and her support of the new law that is widely perceived as antigay in the west.On Thursday, Isinbayeva, who won the gold medal here, suggested that the law reflected the country’s views.
“It’s my opinion also,” she said, adding: “You know, to do all this stuff on the street, we are very afraid about our nation, because we consider ourselves like normal, standard people. We just live boys with women, and women with boys.”
On Friday, she released a statement that was distributed to reporters at the stadium by the I.A.A.F., the sport’s governing body.
“English is not my first language, and I think I may have been misunderstood when I spoke yesterday,” the statement read. “What I wanted to say was that people should respect the laws of other countries, particularly when they are guests.
“But let me make it clear I respect the views of my fellow athletes and let me state in the strongest terms that I am opposed to any discrimination against gay people on the grounds of their sexuality.”
“Don’t worry about a thing,” the song went. “'Cause every little thing gonna be all right. Don’t worry about a thing. ‘Cause every little thing gonna be all right.”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the track, Allyson Felix, Fraser-Pryce’s American rival, had plenty of worries as she sat glumly on a gurney being wheeled out of the stadium.
The 200 has long been Felix’s race: she has won three world titles at the distance and finally won the Olympic 200 title last year in London. If she would have prevailed Friday, she would have become the career leader at the world track and field championships with nine gold medals: one ahead of her American predecessors Carl Lewis and Michael Johnson.
But there would be no breaking the tie on an otherwise lovely evening in Moscow. Deep into the curve, as the formidable opposition accelerated, Felix, the most graceful of sprinters, suddenly began to look awkward on her feet. She lost her rhythm, grimaced, then slowed painfully to a hobble, dropping to the blue track with more than half the race left. She landed on her left side, grabbing at her upper right leg.
USA Track & Field later announced that Felix had a tear in her medial right hamstring.
Felix, a willowy 27-year-old, is not built like most sprinters, something she expressed pride in this week as she discussed her ability to show women of all shapes and sizes that sprinting success is within their reach. But she has perhaps never looked as fragile as she did lying in the curve waiting for help.
Medical personnel soon arrived, and her brother and agent, Wes Felix, carried her off the track in his arms.
It was one of the memorable scenes of these championships, and as Felix exited the stage with presumably little chance of participating in the relays this weekend, the three medalists were understandably enjoying their success.
Fraser-Pryce, the short and powerful Jamaican, crossed the line first in 22.17 seconds, followed by Murielle Ahouré of Ivory Coast in 22.32 and Blessing Okagbare of Nigeria in 22.32.
Those times were well off Felix’s career best of 21.69, but this post-Olympic year is now officially a year to forget for Felix.
“I’m extremely devastated,” Felix said in a statement. “I was really hoping to go out there and put together a great race. Now I am consulting with doctors to figure out what is going on with my right hamstring. It is a serious injury, but I don’t know exactly to what extent. I wish all my teammates the best for the rest of the meet.”
Fraser-Pryce, the 26-year-old known for good reason as the Pocket Rocket, now has her first sprint double at a global championship. She won the 100 at the last two Olympics and had already won the 100 in Moscow, giving her two world titles at that distance, as well.
But this was her first victory in the 200; she finished second to Felix in London last year.
“It’s so unfortunate that this happened,” Fraser-Pryce said of Felix’s injury. “We pray that she will be healthy soon.”
Ahouré, a cosmopolitan 25-year-old polyglot, has lived in France and now lives in Houston after attending the University of Miami. But she continues to represent Ivory Coast, the country of her birth, and spoke eloquently last week after winning silver in the 100 about the importance of giving African women athletic role models.
They had another one last night in Okagbare, a triple threat and imposing presence. She had already finished second here in the long jump and sixth in the 100. Okagbare also has strong American connections as a star at Texas- El Paso.
It was a night for serial achievement, with Mo Farah, one of Britain’s luminaries at the Olympics last year in London, becoming the second man to complete a remarkable double-double by winning the 5,000 and 10,000 at both an Olympics and a world championships.
Kenenisa Bekele, the Ethiopian star, was the first to manage it, and Farah managed it Friday only after holding off a series of ferocious attacks in the final 300 meters of the 5,000 from Isiah Kiplangat Koech of Kenya.
“We Kenyans planned with our team to run the race together, but at the end I ran my own race,” Koech said.
Teeth bared and eyes wide, which is fast becoming a trademark, Farah completed the final lap in 53 seconds to win in 13 minutes 26.98 seconds. Hagos Gebrhiwet of Ethiopia was in second in 13:27.26 after he passed the slowing Koech just before the finish.
Bernard Lagat, the 38-year-old American sporting a beard this year, was sixth after winning gold in the event in 2007 and silver in 2009 and 2011.
It remains a mystery why Farah’s opposition, well aware of his phenomenal kick, continues to leave him relatively fresh for a final push. But racing Farah in any type of race these days is a conundrum, and he plans to move up in distance and run the marathon next year.
“Of course I felt tired after the 10,000; that’s why it was a little bit difficult to go faster from the beginning,” Farah said. “I wanted to run as easy as possible today. I thought that the Kenyans would work as a team and might want to box me in, but it didn’t happen. I was able to go in front and control the race.”
Farah was awarded his gold medal by Sebastian Coe, the former British middle-distance star who was head of the organizing committee for last year’s Olympics in London and is now suggesting that Farah deserves to be considered the greatest British track and field athlete in history.
That is quite a statement, considering that Farah has yet to set a world record. But he has certainly been a formidable medal collector and has perhaps the widest range of any runner on the planet at the moment. (He ran a remarkable 3:28.81 in the 1,500 in Monaco this season.)
“This double was definitely tougher than the Olympic one, because last year nobody knew what I was capable of,” Farah said. “Today was indeed one of the most important days in my career, but I’m the same old guy. I loved Moscow. The atmosphere here is great.”
That is certainly debatable. No session has yet been a sellout, and though the crowds have improved at night this week, there were still two big blocks of empty seats as Usain Bolt returned to the track for the 200 semifinals Friday, qualifying for Saturday’s final.
Other winners on Friday David Storl of Germany with 21.73 meters in the men’s shot put and LaShawn Merritt and the United States with a comfortable victory in the men’s 4x400 relay in 2:58.71 seconds.
Dwight Phillips, the 35-year-old American, could do no better than 11th in what he said was his final major long-jump competition. Phillips won the Olympic title in 2004 and won four world championships, in 2003, 2005, 2009 and 2011.
But this title went Aleksandr Menkov of Russia, who won with a leap of 8.56 meters, the best in the world in four years.
It was a fine night for the Russians. Tatyana Lisenko also won the women’s hammer with a championship record throw of 78.80 meters.
Russia’s biggest track and field star, Yelena Isinbayeva, was engaged in damage control, attempting to calm the furor she generated at a news conference Thursday with her comments about homosexuality in Russia and her support of the new law that is widely perceived as antigay in the west.On Thursday, Isinbayeva, who won the gold medal here, suggested that the law reflected the country’s views.
“It’s my opinion also,” she said, adding: “You know, to do all this stuff on the street, we are very afraid about our nation, because we consider ourselves like normal, standard people. We just live boys with women, and women with boys.”
On Friday, she released a statement that was distributed to reporters at the stadium by the I.A.A.F., the sport’s governing body.
“English is not my first language, and I think I may have been misunderstood when I spoke yesterday,” the statement read. “What I wanted to say was that people should respect the laws of other countries, particularly when they are guests.
“But let me make it clear I respect the views of my fellow athletes and let me state in the strongest terms that I am opposed to any discrimination against gay people on the grounds of their sexuality.”
