Naide Gomes, with a mighty heave with her third and final put, saved her hopes of success in the pentathlon at these 10th IAAF World Indoor Championships.
The 24-year-old Portuguese, originally from Sao Tome and Principe, the smallest country in Africa, held second place after the first two events of the day, the sprint hurdles and high jump, with two personal best performances.
But two rounds into the shot, she only had a no-throw and a modest 13.04-metre put to her name, as her closest rivals for medals seemed to thrive.
Then with her final effort, Gomes - fifth at the World Indoors in Birmingham a year ago - added 89cm to her lifetime best with 15.08m, for 866 vital points to put her into the lead with just the long jump and 800 metres to be contested this afternoon.
Gomes thus became the pentathlon’s third different intermediary leader, as Belgium’s Tia Hellebaut, with 12.39m, fell back to fourth place (2799pts overall).
Natalya Dobrynska, the young Ukrainian, made good progress in her best event, her third-round 15.39m scoring 887pts to move her from fourth to second place, with 2911.
Lithuania’s Austra Skujyte won the shot competition with 16.30m, to take her three-event score to 2890.
