Powell does season best at Athletissima
Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell has run the fastest 100 metres of the year at the Athletissima Diamond League meeting in Lausanne on Thursday.
Powell, clear favourite after Usain Bolt chose to skip the meeting and with American Tyson Gay injured, charged out of the blocks to win in 9.78 seconds, one hundredth of a second better than Gay’s time in Florida earlier this month.
Powell, who held the world record for three years until Bolt’s breakthrough in 2008, was also 0.13 seconds quicker than Bolt’s season best set in Rome last month. Bolt holds the world record at 9.58 seconds.
A second world season-leading performance was delivered by Frenchman Teddy Tamgho in the triple jump, with 17.91 metres.
Also on Thursday, the Swiss women’s 4×100 relay team broke the more than 30-year national record to come in at 43 seconds 90.
The team of Mujinga Kambundji (ST Bern), Jacqueline Gasser (BTV Chur), Clélia Reuse (CABV Martigny) and Lea Sprunger (COVA Nyon) have now also reached the qualifying time for the World Championships in Daegu, South Korea, at the end of August.
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