Tough final season for Fraser-Pryce continues

SHELLY-ANN FRASER-PRYCE’S final Olympic Games in Paris, France, has not been the smoothest and while warming up for the Spitzen Leichathetik World Continental Silver Tour meet in Luzern, Switzerland, Jamaicans were reminded of that.

The 100-metre race was to be just Fraser-Pryce’s fifth race this season, counting the three she used to make the team to the Olympics at the country’s national championships late last month.

However, arguably the greatest 100-metre runner of all time was a no-show, saying she felt something during warm-ups and decided against it.

Still, there was some joy for Jamaican at the meet, as Stacey-Ann Williams made the 400 metres hers, winning in 50.58 seconds, just two-hundredths of a second outside her season best of 50.56.

Kemba Nelson would grab second in the 100 metres in the absence of Fraser-Pryce, finishing just one-hundredth of a second behind Switzerland’s Mujinga Kambundji, 11.20. Nelson’s 11.21 was the same as third-place finisher, Gina Lückenkemper of Germany.

Shashalee Forbes was fifth in 11.31, stopping the clock at the same time as Jodean Williams for sixth. Krystal Sloley was seventh in 11.38.

In section one of the women’s 100 metres, Serena Cole, with a season’s best of 11.24 seconds, was second. Zoe Hobbs of New Zealand won in 11.17, while Briana Willams was sixth in 11.54.

Lanae-Tava Thomas, who was second at the national championships in the women’s 200 metres, was again second yesterday, clocking 22.69 seconds. Jessika Gbai of the Ivory Coast won the event in 22.57, with Kambundji taking third in 22.61. Williams clocked 23.01 for fifth.

Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico, the defending Olympic Games women’s 100-metre hurdles champion, scored a morale-boosting win in the event, clocking 12.41 seconds. Maribel Caicedo of Ecuador was second in 12.64, while Cyrena Samba-Mayela, one of the favourites to take gold in Paris, failed to recover from an early stumble to finish third in 12.85.

National long jump champion, Ackelia Smith, had to settle for fourth in the women’s long jump with a distance of 6.61 metres.

Michael Campbell, competing in the men’s ‘B’ 100 metres, was fifth in 10.37 seconds. In the ‘A’ race, last year’s national champion in the event, Rohan Watson, had to settle for seventh in 10.32.

Schoolboy, Gary Card was seventh in the men’s 200 metres in 21.32 seconds, while national 400-metre record holder Rusheen McDonald’s woes continued in the event.

McDonald finished at the back of the field in eighth with a pedestrian 47.41 seconds.