Asafa's Melbourne bid

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Friday, 15 February 2008 Powell hopeful for Melbourne start next week

http://www.iaaf.org/GP08/news/kind=100/newsid=43392.html [nice picture ofa relaxed Powell in action in Rieti. kk]

Asafa Powell looking the picture of relaxation in his 100m heat in Rieti in which he set the World record of 9.74 (Lorenzo Sampaolo)

relnews Sydney, Australia – World record holder Asafa Powell said today he is confident of racing the 100m at the Melbourne Grand Prix on Thursday 21 February, part of the IAAF World Athletics Tour.

Powell arrived in Australia with four stitches in his left knee and grazing down his shin, consequences of a fall in the stairs at his home in Jamaica.

The world’s fastest man expects to have the stitches removed over the weekend and he said if he can train without inconvenience on Monday he will compete in Melbourne.

"It’s not moving as fast as I would want it to, but things are looking positive. It’s coming along well,” Powell said today as he flew into Sydney with his Caribbean MVP squad led by amiable coach Stephen Francis for the Sydney Grand Prix on Saturday night, 16 February.

The untimely accident forced Powell out of the Sydney Grand Prix, although he was planning only to run the anchor of a 4x100m relay which boasts Darrel Brown and Michael Frater, 100m silver medallists at the 2003 Paris and 2005 Helsinki World championships, respectively.

While Powell was scheduled for a rest week, they usually do trials and, as he said, “This is why I came to Australia, to try to compete to the best of my ability. I really wanted to see what I could do here."

“This week is a rest week for us, so I’m not missing anything in practice,” he said. “But next week if I’m not able to run and train I’ll be missing out.”

Powell did not have the best preparation for last year’s World championships in Osaka and perhaps a sense of manifest destiny lulled him into a false sense of security. He was brought rudely back to earth by American Tyson Gay who shocked the big Jamaican, putting him off his rhythm and ultimately back into the bronze medal position.

“The problem is I get over-confident so I don’t do what I usually do,” he said. “If I just concentrate on running 9.74, I’ll be the winner.”

To date, although he has run two World records, of 9.77 – which he equalled twice – and 9.74 in Rieti following his Osaka reality check, Powell’s medal tally in the majors stands at one, the Osaka bronze. Still, he remains unconcerned, finding confidence in his coach and program.

“I am still young. I have more Olympic Games and world championships to go, so it is just for me to stay strong.”

Mike Hurst for the IAAF

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First major title

The 2006 Commonwealth Games champion will have the chance at the Beijing Olympics in August to answer his detractors by landing his first major title.

“I need to stay focused and not repeat mistakes. Olympics is something that I really would love to win. I’m the fastest man in the world, so people expect you to win those events,” Powell told the Sunday Herald.

“Once I keep running fast, then no one else will beat me, because there’s no one else running my times,” said Powell, who has run the 100 metres in under 10 seconds 33 times.

Only the retired Maurice Greene, who has run under 10 seconds 52 times, has more sub-10 clockings in his career and Powell is the only man to have run legally under 9.80 seconds more than once, having done so five times, and the only man to have run legally under 10.00 seconds 12 times in a single season.

The rest…

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20080218/sports/sports2.html

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ASAFA Powell rates himself an 80 per cent chance of getting to the start line for Thursday night’s Melbourne Grand Prix.

The world 100m record holder hit the track for the first time yesterday since arriving in Australia last week with a badly lacerated knee.

Powell had the four stitches removed on Saturday night and, after starting slowly, managed to finish the session at host Olympic Park with a series of 100m run-throughs at three-quarter pace.

“It’s going good so far,” Powell said. “Today’s the first day so I was a bit cautious. Maybe by tomorrow or Wednesday I won’t be so cautious. I’d say I’m about 70 to 80 (per cent chance).”

The Jamaican superstar cut his knee as he raced up stairs in his home in Kingston when running late for training.

Powell’s coach Stephen Francis said the session went well given Powell had been unable to fully straighten his left leg for nine days.

“He was better than expected,” Francis admitted. "His knee is a bit stiff and he was worried he was going to split it open but we don’t think that is going to happen.

“We are still confident, but he has to run faster tomorrow and flat out on Wednesday.”

After starting gingerly with light jogging on the grass at Olympic Park, Powell started to work the knee more with high-knee lifts.

He then did a series of back-to-back 100m run-throughs with training partner Darrel Brown.

By the end he had reasonable movement and was edging ahead of Brown.

Powell, who lowered his world record to 9.74sec last year, is keen to get his Beijing Olympic preparations under way in the Melbourne event.

His training partner Michael Frater, who finished second at the 2005 world titles, will line-up in the 100m.

Olympic 400m champion Jeremy Wariner trained at Olympic Park after Powell yesterday and showed he was on track to run in the 400m against local favourite and national champion Sean Wroe on Thursday night.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23236728-11088,00.html

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Cany anyone find any start lists?

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In reply to my own message:

http://www.athletics.com.au/freestyler/files/melbourne%20entrant%20list%20as%20at%20300%2019%20feb%2008.pdf

Of note (from a quick glance):
Milburn not in the 400m start list
Miller not starting
Darrel Brown running the duece and not the 100

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COURTESY OF THE IAAF WEBSITE www.iaaf.org
Tuesday, 19 February 2008 Powell recovering but uncertain for Melbourne start, Wariner ready

Asafa Powell on his way to 9.83 seconds win in Stuttgart - World Athletics Final 2007 (Getty Images)

Melbourne, Australia – Asafa Powell struggled at training yesterday as he bids to beat the clock in his race to recover from a cut knee in time to compete in the 100m in the Melbourne Grand Prix, as the World Athletics Tour resumes this Thursday night.

The world record-holder fell in the stairs at his home in Jamaica and needed four stitches to his left knee the day before he was due to fly to Australia.

He was forced out of last weekend’s Sydney Grand Prix but with the stitches now removed, he ran 20 run-throughs over 100m in Melbourne on Monday and was moving freely towards the end of the light comeback session.

But the after-effect of bending his knee, much less running, after nine days with stitches restricting him told on the world’s fastest man and he was in pain this morning even before he returned to the track.

“There is some inflammation inside (the knee) so we just have to get rid of that,” Powell said today, still determined to compete on Thursday night despite lengthening odds against it.

Athletics Australia track agent Maurie Plant, who has escorted Powell and his MVP squad while in Australia, admitted: “When I saw him train on Monday I was very encouraged and would have said he was 80 per cent likely to race on Thursday but after the Tuesday session he had a bit of trouble from the knee and I’d rate him 30 per cent chance of starting.

“However, Asafa is very serious about it. He wants to race this Thursday and he’s got some serious anti-inflammatory for his knee and he’s going to have another bash at it in the morning (Wednesday).”

Powell explained that while it was the most important season of his career, it was also a long season and he said “so if I’m feeling unbearable pain I will pull out”.

“I’m getting better day by day and this morning it looked a lot better than yesterday, but it felt worse. We will see how it goes in the morning but this is not a year to risk it,” Powell added.

Wariner ready for 400m debut

Attention now has focussed on Jeremy Wariner who will open his 400m campaign on Thursday, with Australian titleholder and Osaka World championship semi-finalist Sean Wroe expected to give him a close run.

Only one Australian, Robert Stone in the summer of 1989-1990, has ever broken 45sec in Melbourne and Wroe hopes to be the next man. He finished full of running to win the Sydney 400m last Saturday in 45.84 but is hopeful of improving on his personal best of 45.25 set in Osaka.

Wariner’s training partner Darold Williamson, an Athens Olympic relay gold medallist, and Australia’s Clinton Hill, who anchored the Athens Olympic silver medal winning 4x400m team, are also in the race.

[b]Unfortunately another young Australian, Joel Milburn, 21, who clocked a breakthrough 45.19 in Sydney on 9 February, has withdrawn from Melbourne after further study of scans of his painful right knee indicate a low grade tear of a tendon.

“The Australian team doctor Tim Barbour and physiotherapist Brent Kirkbride think if I’m careful with it now it will be 100 per cent alright by the time of the Australian championships (28 Feb- 2 March),” Milburn said.[/b]

Wariner was pressed for speed when he was beaten over 200m in Sydney, but his extensive tempo training at the moment suggests he will offer a much more difficult target to shoot down in the 400m when he will be able to relax into that killer rhythm which typifies his best one-lap performances.

“It’s a new year and training has been really good so I’m looking forward to seeing what I can do,” Wariner said at a Melbourne luncheon yesterday hosted by John Landy, the former Governor of the state of Victoria and history’s second sub four minute miler.

“That’s my goal every time I’m on the track – to run fast.

“Hopefully on Thursday I’ll break 45 seconds for the third year in a row (in his opening 400m of the season).”

Local focus on Hooker, Mottram

Pole vaulter Steve Hooker, who recently cleared six metres during a Perth interclub meet, and distance runner Craig Mottram will shoulder Australian expectations.

Mottram was disappointed by the late withdrawal of Tariku Bekele whose Ethiopian federation ordered him to remain in Europe and prepare for the World Indoor championships in Valencia, Spain, from 7-9 March.

After breaking his own national indoor 3000m record and clocking the fastest indoor time on US boards in Boston three weeks ago, Mottram looks ready to dominate Thursday’s 5000m despite the presence of Abreham Cherkos, the world’s second fastest junior last year, plus a squad of good Kenyans and Tanzanians.

Mike Hurst (Sydney Daily Telegraph) for the IAAF

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If AP doesn’t run, what should he do to make up these races, that we found seem to be crucial for his peak later in the year?

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That’s the point of being there now. if he misses a fgew now, he has time to get them later on.

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:slight_smile: Maybe he will start afterall

20.02.2008
Asafa wants to rise to the occasion
‘Asafa’ is an African name meaning ‘rise to the occasion’ and that is what the world’s fastest man wants to do at the IAAF World Athletics Tour meeting at Melbourne’s Olympic Park tomorrow night.

After training without any pain this morning, 100m world record holder Asafa Powell declared that he was a “90 percent chance” of lining up in this signature 100m event.

"I would say after today’s workout that things went well and I can run through the finish line.

“I can run at 90 percent (today) so I would say 90 percent,” Powell added when summing up his chances of competing, a stark improvement on his assessment of less than 50 percent yesterday.

“The problem is can I come out of the blocks, so the coach says tomorrow if I can exit the blocks properly then I’ll run for sure.”

Powell won’t test his knee tomorrow morning, preferring to arrive at the meet ready to run. He plans to warm up at his regular time of around one-and-a-half hours before his race and undertake a final test in the starting blocks 30 minutes before his scheduled 100m start time at 8:17pm.

“I will just come to the meet preparing to run and if I can’t come out of the blocks then it’s bad luck for me, but if I can come out of the blocks at at least 90 percent then I’ll run,” he confirmed.

“I can bend it and that’s what I wanted, the pain that I had yesterday is gone, but it will be the starting blocks that is going to decide.”

When asked his message to fans thinking of coming to watch him run for 10 seconds, Powell paused, smiled and said, “come out and see me for maybe nine seconds.”

Powell’s coach Stephen Francis wouldn’t put a percentage on his charge’s chances, preferring to concentrate on what would be required tomorrow to clear Powell for take-off.

“It will depend on two factors,” Francis said after the session. "If he can do his starts tomorrow in warm-up and two, if he thinks he is well enough to win. If those two things are right, he’ll run.

“He has not done any starts since the incident happened, so he may go out there and feel uncomfortable in the blocks, exploding from the blocks, or he might feel sore from his workout this morning, but unless those things happen he’ll be OK.”

Powell completed a series of 100m efforts at an ever-increasing pace, albeit in his running shoes rather than spikes.

The session was a significant improvement on his display on Monday, when he took to the track for the first time following the removal of the stitches in his lacerated left knee. The contrast to yesterday’s session was even starker, with the world’s fastest man unable to train at all on Tuesday after he pulled up sore from his workout on Monday.

In other news, Ethiopian distance running dynamo Abreham Cherkos Feleke has arrived in Melbourne for his 5000m clash with Craig Mottram.

In an interesting twist, Feleke has been added to the Ethiopian team for the IAAF World Indoor Championships in Spain next month. The Ethiopian federation wanted Feleke to remain in Addis Ababa, however, he had already commenced his journey to Melbourne.

World junior 5000m champion Tariku Bekele had already been forced to withdraw by his federation who required that he remain in Europe to prepare for the indoor championships.

The World Athletics Tour meet in Melbourne will celebrate its 21st birthday tomorrow night.

Tuesday afternoon’s John Landy Lunch Club function served as the official preview of the meet, featuring dual Olympic gold medallist and chairman of the London 2012 Organising Committee Lord Sebastian Coe. Listen to the audio from Lord Coe’s address here

Event: World Athletics Tour - Melbourne
Day: Thursday, February 21, 2008
Time: Main program from 7:30pm
Where: Melbourne Olympic Park, Olympic Boulevard
Tickets: Available from Ticketek on 13 2849 or www.ticketek.com.au