Saudi Arabia is a coming force in world athletics.
That was the clear message from the final of the men's 100 metres at the World Youth Championships, where Yahya Al-Gahes and Yahya Hassan Habib snatched the gold and silver medals, bringing their tally so far at the championships to six.
Running into a 3m/s headwind from a gathering storm, Al-Gahes clocked 10.69 to his team mate's 10.73, with Britain's Craig Pickering recovering from another poor start to take his team's first medal of the championships, the bronze, with 10.85, two-hundredths ahead of the Canadian pair of David Pedneault and Pierre-Hans Horacius, who both recorded the same 10.87.
It was an extraordinary outcome for the Blue Riband event at a major championship, since it was significant for the absence of any athletes from the United States, following the disqualification in the semi-finals of Michael Grant, one of the favourites for gold.
