It was celebration time for Cuban athletes as day one at the World Athletics Final rounded up in the Stade Louis II tonight. In the space of ten minutes Osleidys Menendez backed her World Javelin title with the World Athletics Final win while Yoandri Betanzos improved on his silver medal in Helsinki to take his first major Championship win.
The 23-year-old triple jumper landed at a new season’s best of 17.46m in his fourth and last jump to overtake fellow Brazilian Jadel Gregorio who had been in the lead with a 17.32m second round jump.
Walter Davis was just one of the many World champions from Helsinki who had to be content with a good placing here as he finished third with a best effort of 17.23m.
Russia’s Danyla Burkenya was the only other athlete over 17 metres tonight (17.10) in fourth.
Sixth in Helsinki, Gregorio opened with a decent 17.08m to take the lead with Betanzos in second with 16.98m. Both athletes improved their mark in the second round to 17.32m and 17.21m respectively with Davis making his way up with a decent 17.17m effort.
Gregorio fouled in round three while Davis overtook Betanzos. With the reverse order of jump in the fourth round, the Cuban gathered all his energy and supported by the back straight crowd leapt a superb 17.46m.
The wait wasn’t too long; Davis landed at 17.21m and Gregorio at 16.87m. The 30,000$ went to Cuba!
Tonight’s marked Betanzos first major win following his silver medals in Paris 2003 and Helsinki 2004, his World Youth silver (1999) and World Junior silver (2000).
LA
