Bailey breaks into long jump top-10
FORMER Kingston College and University of Arkansas long jumper Alain Bailey was the only Jamaican field event athlete ranked in the top 10 of their specialty at the end of the 2010 track and field season.
Bailey, a member of the Jamaican team to the 2009 IAAF World Championships in Berlin, Germany, was fourth on the world rankings with a personal best 8.35 metres set while competing for the University of Arkansas in May this year.
He finished behind world leader Christian Reif of Germany, 8.47, American Dwight Phillips, 8.46 and Australian Fabrice Lapierre, 8.40 and had the seventh best performance of the year.
Bailey ended his four-year stint at Arkansas with six South Eastern Conference (SEC) titles, including the 2010 Indoors title and went professional earlier after signing with Claude Bryan’s On Track Management group.
The next best field event performance by a Jamaican, according to statistics complied by statistics guru Charles Fuller, came in the shot put where national record-holder Dorian Scott was 19th in the world with a season-best 20.55m done at the Jamaica Trials in June.
Scott is a member of Jamaica’s team to the 19th Commonwealth Games set to get underway in India today.
Jamaicans were dominant in the sprints as Veronica Campbell Brown and Shelly-Ann Fraser were first and second, respectively, in the 100 metres, while the former also led the 200 metres ranking.
Double world record-holder Usain Bolt led the men’s 200 metres ranking.
Nesta Carter, who had a breakout year, was second in the 100 with 9.78 seconds, followed by Bolt’s 9.82 and Asafa Powell also with 9.82, with Yohan Blake further back in seventh place with 9.89 and Mario Forsythe rounding out the top 10 with 9.95.
Blake was also fourth in the 200m with a personal best 19.78 seconds, with Powell in sixth place with 19.97 and Berlin relay gold medallist Steve Mullings in 10th place with 20.11.
Jermaine Gonzales’ national record of 44.40 seconds set in Monaco in July saw him ranked second in the world ahead of compatriot Ricardo Chambers, whose 44.54 also set in Monaco placed him third.
Sprint hurdles national record-holder Dwight Thomas finished seventh with a season-best 13.25 seconds, while Leford Green — who was running his first full season in the 400 hurdles — was 11th in the world with his personal best 48.47 seconds set while winning the event at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Puerto Rico in July.
Diamond League champion Kaliese Spencer was third in the 400m hurdles with a season best 53.33 seconds, with Continental Cup double gold medallist Nickiesha Wilson eighth with 54.52.
Shericka Williams and Novlene Williams-Mills were fifth and sixth, respectively, in the 400, while Kenia Sinclair was also fifth in the 800.