The ÅF Golden League 2009 which continues at the ExxonMobil Bislett Games in Oslo, Norway, on Friday 3 July, will witness a run-off between the three medallists from the Beijing Olympics women’s 400m.

The women’s 400m at this year’s Oslo meet promises to be one of the most eagerly anticipated contests of the European mid-summer as Britain’s Olympic champion Christine Ohuruogu meets up with silver and bronze medallists Jamaica’s Shericka Williams, and Sanya Richards of the USA.

The added spark in the encounter is that Richards who won the opening meet of the ÅF Golden League in Berlin on 14 June is one of those ten aspirants for the $1 Million ÅF Golden League Jackpot.

Ohuruogu, 25, is a true 'big meet' performer having won at the 2006 Commonwealth Games and 2007 World Championships before her crowning achievement last year when she took the Olympic title. The Briton has so far run only once over the one-lap this summer with a 51.14 sec victory in Montreuil-sous-Bois, France on 11 June, though her PB of 49.61 from when winning the World title, and her gutsy 49.62 assault on the Olympic laurels represents the true mark of her talent.

Williams with a 49.69 sec PB for the Olympic silver medal was one of the surprises of Beijing. This was the first and so far only time that the 23-year-old has been below 50sec in her career and what a time to do it. This year so far in her three 400m races, all of which have been at IAAF World Athletics Tour meetings, she has been third in Doha, and second in New York and Eugene with a best of 50.58 in New York.

Richards, 24, is an awesome talent who in her young career has already shared the Golden League Jackpot and taken the title of Athlete of the Year, both in 2006. She is a dangerous competitor at 100m and 200m but it is in the 400m where her great talent lies as her personal best of 48.70 reflects. Richards was not at her best in Beijing and had to settle for a bronze medal as Ohuruogu and Williams passed her in the home straight. In 2007, the effects of an illness helped prevent Richards from even making the USA team at her specialist event at the Osaka World Championships, though she had taken a silver medal over 400m two years’ earlier in Helsinki.
 
In Oslo’s famous Bislett stadium, everyone will look again for Richards who sped to a magnificent world season lead of 49.57 in Berlin on the back of her 49.86 victory in Eugene the week before (7 June), to use her pace early in the race to try and establish a commanding lead over Ohuruogu and Williams. Once that marker has been put down by the American it will then be up to the Briton and the Jamaican to try and stage a possible replay of Beijing. Anyone having witnessed Richards’ effortless ease in the home straight in Berlin will agree that on current form they will have their work cut out in Bislett.

Chris Turner for the IAAF