Yargeris Savigne of Cuba competes in the Women's Triple Jump qualification during day one - WIC Istanbul (© Getty Images)
Yamile Aldama (GBR), the oldest woman in the field, and Olga Rypakova (KAZ), the best performer in the world in the past four years, were the only two women to better the automatic qualifying distance of 14.30 metres in women’s triple jump.
Aldama, five months short of her 40th birthday, produced a 14.62 metre effort on her first jump to move directly to the final on Saturday evening.
The veteran jumper has had an outstanding record in the World Indoor Championships without ever actually winning. She was sixth and seventh for Cuba in 1997 and 1999, respectively, then finished second, third and fifth for Sudan in 2004, 2006 and 2008.
Now Aldama competes for Great Britain, for whom she placed fifth in the World Championships in Daegu last year.
Rypakova also qualified for the final on her first attempt, producing a 14.39 later in the first round of qualifying group A. The defending champion from Doha 2010, her 15.25 outdoors to win at the IAAF Continental Cup in 2010 is the longest jump in the world since 2008.
Anna Krylova of Russia was the leading jumper in group B with 14.27. The surprise of the group was the performance of Yargeris Savigne (CUB), who qualified for the final only in fourth place (and eighth overall) with a modest 14.09. Still, it is only qualifying, and the two-time outdoor world champion and Valencia 2008 World Indoor champion lived to fight it out in the final.
Her Cuban teammate Mabel Gay (14.22) and Dana Veldakova of the Slovak Republic (14.21) were the other two qualifiers from the first group, with China’s Yanmei Li (14.23) and Kimberly Williams of Jamaica (14.15) filling the second and third places between Krylova and Savigne in group B.
Len Johnson for the IAAF
