Moscow, Russia - Athletes from 20 counties will compete in 15 events in Luzhniki stadium at the Moscow Open, an EA Permit meeting, on Wednesday 1 July for prizes offered by the Mayor of Moscow.

The Moscow Open is one of a select group of Area meetings at which points can be acquired by athletes to qualify for the IAAF / VTB Bank World Athletics Final, to be held on 12-13 September in Thessaloniki, Greece.

World champion Tatyana Lebedeva, one of the most cherished Russian athletes, will make her first start of the 2009 season when she takes part in the women’s Long Jump. She'll be confronted by World Indoor champion Naide Gomes from Portugal, 6.90m so far this summer, Estonia Kseniya Balta the European Indoor champion who jumped a national record of 6.71m in the process of winning that title, and Russia’s Olga Kucherenko who with her personal best of 6.85m in Gothenburg on 9 June is the best Russian so far this outdoor season.

The Russian national team won the Olympic gold medal in the Women's 4x100m relay, and this quartet of runners  will compete individually at 200m which is the favourite distance for three of them, Aleksandra Fedoriva, Yulia Gushchina, Yuliya Chermoshanskaya, while Yevgeniya Polyakova prefers the 100m and runs the 200m for the first time this season.

Anna Alminova who won the European Indoor crown at 1500m this winter looks the favourite at this distance, while the rising star of the season Yelena Kofanova (1:59.09) will run the 800m in the dangerous company of the well experienced Tatyana Andrianova, the 2008 Russian champion (1:56.00 PB) and Yekaterina Kostetskaya  (1:56.67 PB in 2008).

Yuriy Borzakovskiy, who after the upset of not making it to the 800m final in Beijing to defend his Olympic title but came back this winter to win the European Indoor crown, makes only his second start over 800m of this outdoor season after coming a lowly seventh in Eugene at the start of June.

Ivan Ukhov who high jumped a national record of 2.40m in Athens this winter indoors and later took the European Indoor title has been the revelation of 2009, and is in good form this summer too with a 2.34 season's best. Yaroslav Rybakov, the Olympic bronze medallist, and Aleksandr Shustov, both already having jumped 2.31m this summer, will for sure challenge Ukhov.

Igor Pavlov, Yevgeniy Lukianenko and Pavel Gerasimov are the top Russian trio to line-up in the Pole Vault.

Kim Collins, the 2003 World 100m champion who most recently grabbed a global medal when coming joint second at the World Indoor championships in Valencia in 2008 is the obvious favourite at the 100m.

The Men's Shot Put is likely to be between Olympic champion Tomasz Majewski of Poland and 2003 World champion Andrey Mikhnevich from Belarus who took the bronze in Beijing.

The Men will compete in 8 events – 100m, 800m, 3000m Steeplechase, High Jump, Long Jump, Trple Jup, Shot Put and Hammer Throw; the Women will fight for the glories in 7 events, mostly in running – 200m, 400m, 800m, 1500m, 100m Hurdles, Long Jump and Shot Put.

Nickolai Dolgopolov and Rostislav Orlov for the IAAF